Perna perna
Perna perna, the brown mussel, is an economically important mussel, a bivalve mollusc belonging to the family Mytilidae. It is harvested as a food source but is also known to harbor toxins and cause damage to marine structures. It is native to the waters of Africa, Europe, and South America and was introduced in the waters of North America.

Veronidae · CC BY-SA 3.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.
On record
Recorded, not inferred- Sits inside
- PernaPBDB
- Diet
- suspension feederPBDB, for Mytilidae
- Life habit
- epifaunalPBDB, for Mytilidae
- Motility
- stationary, attachedPBDB, for Mytilidae
- Vision
- blindPBDB, for Bivalvia
- Environment
- lagoonal,coastal,inner shelf,outer shelf,oceanic,brackish,freshwaterPBDB, for Mytilidae
Time the record covers
At least 2.4 million years on record.
The record covers at least 2.58 Mya to 129 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 5.333 Mya to 11.7 ka.
12 occurrences of Perna perna on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.
When
12 occurrences- Pliocene25%
- Pleistocene75%
These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.
Found in
1 formation
Loading coastlines…
The named rock units Perna perna has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 11 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Perna perna and its relatives
PleistoceneWhere Perna perna and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.
Found in the same rock
94 taxa- Buccinum digitale5 sites
- Conus4 sites
- Patella4 sites
- Amblychilepas scutellum3 sites
- Calyptraea kilburni3 sites
- Carditella3 sites
- Nassarius3 sites
- Nucella praecingulata3 sites
- Oxystele3 sites
- Scutellastra barbara3 sites
- Standella3 sites
- Striostrea margaritacea3 sites
- Tellina3 sites
- Turbo3 sites
- Turritella (Torquesia) carinifera3 sites
- Afrocominella capensis2 sites
- Arca2 sites
- Austriumphis dilemma2 sites
- Bullia laevissima2 sites
- Burnupena2 sites
- Chamelea2 sites
- Chiton2 sites
- Choromytilus meridionalis2 sites
- Clanculus2 sites
The Paleobiology Database records 7 sites for Perna perna, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.
This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.
Entered from
6 references- Late Tertiary and Early Quaternary Fossil Mollusca for the Hondeklip Area, Cape Province, South Africa3
- Recherches sur le Neogene et le Quaternaire marins de la cote Atlantique du Maroc3
- Pleistocene shorelines in the Western Cape and South-West Africa2
- Revised list of South African late Tertiary and Pleistocene marine Mollusca2
- A new fossil Cypraea (Gastropoda, Prosobranchia) from South Africa with notes on the Alexandria Formation1
- Molluschi delle spiagge emerse del Mar Rosso e dell'Oceano Indiano, parte II (Lamellibranchi) [Mollusks from raised beaches bordering the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean, part II (bivalves)]1
Each of the 12 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.
Media and terms
Media content2
Picture of Perna perna
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Veronidae
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 3.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
3D model
- Source
- Sketchfab
- Licence
- CC0 Public Domain
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.
The description on this site
- Source
- Wikipedia, “Perna perna”
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 4.0
This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.
Keep going
What may have been alongside itPerna through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Linnaeus 1758)