“…is a worldwide, coastal, brackish, and estuarine mussel, that is very abundant in the Baltic Sea, acting as a foundation species and playing an important ecological role in benthic nutrient recycling (Kautsky & Wallentinus, 1980; Norling & Kautsky, 2008). Based on the example of the Baltic Mytilus spp., it was shown that the availability of seawater Ca 2+ and DIC for organisms affects calcification (Thomsen et al, 2018), yet the mechanisms underlying decreasing calcification rates along decreasing salinity are not fully understood (Sanders et al, 2021). In the Baltic Sea, alkalinity, the concentrations of Ca 2+ , the saturation state of CaCO 3 , and the ratio of calcification substrates (Ca 2+ and HCO 3− ) to the concentration of protons (H + ) decrease along the salinity gradient (Beldowski et al, 2010; Müller et al, 2016; Sanders et al, 2021) and create changing conditions for the calcification process, making the Baltic Sea an ideal model system to investigate the variability of skeletal mineralogy and geochemistry between calcareous invertebrates.…”