THE BOTTLE-ANIMALCULE, FOLLICULINA; ŒCOLOGICAL NOTES

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Abstract
1. This protozoan occurs in the brackish waters of branches of the Chesapeake Bay in temporary association with the fresh water plants Elodea and Potamogeton. 2. Its adjustment to the growth of these plants is brought about by the migrations of motile forms that escape from the tubes of the sessile forms. 3. These motile forms respond to light and to solids, and these actions seem to keep them ever settling upon newer parts of the plants during the season. 4. The motile forms add materially to the plankton during the summer. 5. Folliculina appears in the early summer and disappears before the plants die down in the autumn, forming part of a temporary community in which marine forms depend upon the fresh water plants for attachment and existence above the bottom. Presumably these animals migrate in from the salt water and die out every year. 6. The peculiar groupings of Folliculina suggesting some common bond may be partly explained as due to the secretions they put forth when about to build their cases. 7. The anatomy of the motile and sessile forms and the mode of formation of the case will be considered elsewhere.

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