Native freshwater mussels, including the critically endangered freshwater pearl mussel, face welfare threats from water quality deterioration, siltation, and over-harvesting.
Freshwater mussel welfare raises the philosophical question of invertebrate sentience in an ecologically significant context. While the capacity for mussel suffering is uncertain, their ecological role as filter feeders — improving water quality and providing habitat for other species — means that mussel welfare is inseparable from broader freshwater ecosystem health. The dramatic decline of freshwater pearl mussels represents a welfare and conservation failure driven by agricultural intensification. Conservation breeding and river restoration programmes address both population recovery and the welfare of surviving individuals by improving the water quality conditions these animals require.