Bacterial feeding by the rotifer Brachionus calyciflorus: Clearance and ingestion rates, behavior and population dynamics.

The rotifer Brachionus calyciflorus is capable of collecting and ingesting cells or short chains of a laboratory-grown bacterium Aerobacter aerogenes. Clearance rate, the volume of water effectively processed animal h, does not vary systematically with bacterial density between 0.01 and 100 μg dry weight ml. Consequently, ingestion rates are strongly density-dependent, reaching maximal values at the highest food densities tested. Bacterial feeding rates are consistently lower than those determined with larger food types, except in very dense cell suspensions. A. aerogenes in high concentration (100 μg ml) induces Brachionus to orient their pseudotrochal cirri to form screens over the buccal funnel; this behavior is at least four times less frequently observed at low (10 μg ml) food density. Despite its occurrence, pseudotrochal screening appears ineffective in regulating bacterial ingestion rate. B. calyciflorus can be cultured xenically for greater than 40 generations fed A. aerogenes alone, with no diminution in net reproductive rate or intrinsic rate of natural increase, and no lengthening in cohort generation time.