Common mussel  (Mytilus edulis)

Extremely common around the coasts of Britain; very large commercial mussel beds occur in the Wash, Conway bay, Morecambe Bay, and estuaries of southwest England, west Scotland and west Wales (3). Elsewhere, it is found from the White Sea in northern Russia to southern France, and in the West Atlantic from Canada to North Carolina (3). It also occurs off Chile, the Falkland Isles, Argentina and the Kerguelen Isles (3).

The common mussel can be found from the middle shore to the shallow sublittoral zone, and attaches to substrates such as piers, rocks and stones with protein threads known as 'byssus' (2). It may also occur on soft sediments in estuaries, and large beds often form; mussels are farmed commercially in many areas (2).