Currently, it is thought to occur in Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Kentucky, West Virginia, and Ontario.

It has been extirpated from Lake Erie, where it once lived in shallow shores and around islands, and the Detroit River, due to invasive zebra and quagga mussels.

On the inside of the shell, it has unusually heavy teeth (structures along the inner hinge line) for a small mussel.

[5] It lives in small rivers and creeks with gravel or sandy riffles, pools, or flats, and sometimes in the shallow areas of lakes.

[6] Both adults and juveniles create byssal threads made of protein to anchor themselves to gravel or other objects in the water.

[4] Freshwater mussels in general are filter-feeders that siphon oxygen and food such as phytoplankton and microorganisms from the water.

To attract a host fish, the female rayed bean gapes her shell and exposes her white swollen gills that contain the glochidia.

After spending 1-2 weeks attached to the fish's gills, the larvae finish metamorphosing and drop off as juvenile mussels.

[7] The rayed bean has been found in shell middens at Native American archaeological sites in small percentages.

[8] The species is preyed upon by muskrat, racoon, mink, river otter, striped skunk, feral hogs, hellbender salamander, turtles, aquatic birds, and some fish.

Navigation channels, dredging, agricultural run-off, and livestock trampling of river edges cause sedimentation and disrupt mussel habitat.

Mussels have been shown to have high sensitivity to pollutants such as ammonia, metals, chlorine, and pesticides, and may affect them even in levels determined "safe" by EPA standards.

[4] Pharmaceutical pollution from wastewater is an emerging but relatively unstudied threat and is common in the rayed bean's habitat.

Two introduced fish species, the round goby and the black carp, are aggressive predators of mussels.

[9] Dreissenid mussels from Fanshawe Lake in Ontario represent a potentially devastating threat to the Thames River population.

[9] It holds protection at the state and provincial levels in several jurisdictions including Ontario, Michigan, Ohio, and Indiana.