Chickamauga Reservoir Mussels 89 



increased in abundance as a result of impoundment of the Tennessee 

 River is O. reflexa. Although Morrison (1942) did not encounter O. 

 reflexa in the Pickwick Basin mounds, it was present during prehistoric 

 times in the upper Tennessee River as evidenced by three valves from 

 the Widows Creek site (Warren 1975) and two shells from the Chicka- 

 mauga Reservoir middens (one valve from each of two multicomponent 

 sites, 40RH18 and 40RH39, not included in this study). It is a typical 

 river species that can adapt to a lake environment (Klippel and Parma- 

 lee 1979). 



Data recovered from archaeological sites along the banks of the 

 Chickamauga Reservoir have provided information that greatly enhan- 

 ces our understanding of the diachronic variability in the mussel fauna 

 of the Upper Tennessee River. Pardue (1981), by considering presence 

 /absence of species recovered from the upper Tennessee between 1918 

 and 1980, has clearly delineated the magnitude of change that has taken 

 place in less than a century. Our data, recovered from archaeological 

 contexts, suggests that comparatively little change took place over as 

 much as two millennia preceding EuroAmerican settlement along this 

 section of the river. Although the invasion and establishment of "new" 

 species in the impounded stretches of the Tennessee River is noteworthy 

 and may provide a potentially valuable commerical resource, these 

 latecomers fail to equal the loss of so many of the river's endemic spe- 

 cies that were once a part of one of the richest naiad faunas in the 

 world. 



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. — We would like to express our thanks 

 to Betty W. Creech for typing the manuscript and to Terry Faulkner for 

 preparing Figure 2. Appreciation is extended to Tennessee Valley 

 Authority officials, Division of Property and Services, for granting 

 permission to sample aboriginal shell middens on property easements 

 held by that agency. 



LITERATURE CITED 



Bates, John M. 1962. The impact of impoundment on the mussel fauna of 



Kentucky Reservoir, Tennessee River. Am. Midi. Nat. tf#(l):232-236. 

 Isom, Billy G. 1969. The mussel resource of the Tennessee River. Malacologia 



7(2-3):397-425. 

 Johnson, Richard I. 1978. Systematics and zoogeography of Plagiola (-Dysno- 



mia-Epioblasma), an almost extinct genus of freshwater mussels (Bivalvia: 



Unionidae) from middle North America. Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool. Harv. 



Univ. /45(6):239-320. 

 Klippel, Walter E., and P.W. Parmalee. 1979. The naiad fauna of Lake 



Springfield, Illinois: an assessment after two decades. Nautilus 94 



(4): 189-197. 

 Lewis, Thomas M.N., and M. Kneberg. 1946. Hiwassee Island. Univ. Tenn. 



Press, Knoxville. 188 pp. 



