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The World of Protozoa, Rotifera, Nematoda and Oligochaeta

Ref ID : 2594

D.A. Everitt; An ecological study of an Antarctic freshwater pool with particular reference to Tardigrada and Rotifera. Hydrobiologia 83:225-237, 1981

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Deep Lake Tarn is a small pool in the Vestfold Hills, Antarctica, which freezes solid seasonally. When free water is present, rotifers, tardigrades, nematodes, protozoans and bacteria are active and are mainly associated with an algal mat composed of cyanophytes, chlorophytes chrysophytes and a pyrrophyte. Hypsibius arcticus (Murray) (Tardigrada) reached a maximum density of 470 individuals per g wet weight of algal mat and individuals took about three months to reach full size. A new species of Isohypsibius was recorded and will be described elsewhere. Tardigrades overwintered in their cryptobiotic state. The population density of bdelloid rotifers changed cyclically, peaking at three-weekly intervals during summer. They also overwintered in their cryptobiotic state. Monogonont rotifers appeared only in summer and species succession occurred. They are thought to overwinter as resting eggs. Two bdelloid rotifers, Macrotrachela quadricornifera (Milne) and Mniobia russeola (Zelinka) and one monogonont rotifer Ptygura sp., are new records for continental Antarctica.