Perna (Mytilus)
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Mollusca
Class: Pelecypoda
• Perna is commonly known as the ‘Sea mussel’.
• Edible, sedentary, marine mollusc.
• The body of perna is soft and divisible into foot and visceral mass, distinct head is absent.
• Body is enclosed with in a calcareous bivalve shell.
• Shells are hinged together antereo –dorsally by a hinge segment.
• Shell valves are drawn inward and outward by adductor muscles.
• Perna has a ventral pedal groove which leads basally to a byssus cavity.
• Byssus threads helps for attachment to a substratum.
• Vascular – respiratory membrane called plicate membrane.