''Epioblasma turgidula'', the turgid blossom pearly mussel, turgid riffle shell, turgid-blossom naiad or turgid blossom, was a species of freshwater mussel, a mollusk in the family Unionidae. The US Fish and Wildlife Service declared the species extinct and delisted it from the

Endangered Species Act The Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA or "The Act"; 16 U.S.C. § 1531 et seq.) is the primary law in the United States for protecting imperiled species. Designed to protect critically imperiled species from extinction as a "consequence of ec ...

in 2023. This species was native to the United States, where it was found in the drainage of the

Cumberland River The Cumberland River is a major waterway of the Southern United States. The U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed June 8, 2011 river drains almost of southern Kentucky and ...

, Tennessee River, and several rivers in the Ozark Mountains. Its natural habitat was riffles and shoals of medium rivers, which have now largely been destroyed by dam construction and dredging. Like most other mussels in the sensitive genus ''Epioblasma'', this species experienced severe declines during industrialization due to pollution, siltation and habitat destruction. The last known population was recorded in 1965 from the Duck River in Tennessee, near the town of Normandy. This population was killed by the construction of

Normandy Dam Normandy Dam is a dam built by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) on the Duck River in the U.S. state of Tennessee. It straddles the border between Bedford and Coffee counties. Completed in 1976, the dam was built primarily for flood control an ...

in the following years. A recently dead specimen was collected in the Duck River at Normandy in 1972.

References

Extinct bivalves Bivalves described in 1858 Taxonomy articles created by Polbot turgidula {{Unionidae-stub