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Asian clam
Asian clam (Corbicula fluminea) [nonnative]
Photo © Robert E. Warren
Features and Behaviors
FEATURES
The Asian clam has a small, yellow-brown to black shell with concentric, regularly spaced ridges. Its shell is rounded to triangular. The inside of the shell is white or purple. This organism may grow to one and one-half inches in length.
BEHAVIOR
The Asian clam lives in the silt, mud, sand or gravel bottom of lakes and streams. This clam has a free-swimming larva. It filters small organisms from the water for its food. The Asian clam was introduced into western North America in the 1920s and 1930s and has spread throughout much of the United States.
Illinois Range
Taxonomy
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Mollusca
Class: Bivalvia
Order: Veneroida
Family: Cyrenidae
Illinois Status: common, nonnative
