Investigation On The Dichotrophy Fauna In

Tardigrades are a kind of hydrophilous micrometazoans commonly called "water bears". They belong to the phylum Tardigrada. Phylogenetically, this phylum is close to Arthropoda. Most tardigrade species can survive extreme environment. They could be found in moss, lichen, soil, leaf litter and sediment of lake and sea. Over 1000 species have been described all over the world. This paper investigated the tardigrade fauna of the Micang Mountains, China. Over 3000 specimens were collected from ten sampling sites including Mount Niutou, Baxianzhai, Luorendong, Mount Huoyan, Mount Xiangtou, Mount Dataiyang, Mount Shima, Mount Fenghuang, Mount Daliang, and Mount Tiechuan. They belong to two classes, three orders, four genera, twenty species. These species are Cornechiniscus lobatus, Echiniscus tessellates, Echiniscus wendt, Pseudechiniscus jiroveci, Pseududechiniscus juanitae, Pseudechiniscus suillus, Hypsibius convergens, Hypsibius dujardini, Isohypsibius lunulatus, Isohypsibius prosostomus, Isohypsibius sattleri, Macrobiotus hamsworthi, Macrobiotus Hufelandi, Minibiotus intermedius, Ramazzottius oberhaeuseri, Diphascon (Diphascon) patanei, Diphascon (Adropion) scoticus, Diphascon (Adropion) triodon, Diphascon (Diphascon) pingue and Milnesium tardigradum. Of the whole specimens,659 belong to C. lobatus accouting for 21.4% of the total,483 belong to M. hufelandi accouting for 15.7% of the total,263 belong to M. intermedius accounting for 8.5%,267 belong to H. dujardini, accounting for 8.7%,213 belong to P. jiroveci accounting for 6.9%,206 belong to H. convergens accounting for 6.7%,189 belong to I. lunulatus accounting for 6.1%,175 belong to M. hamsworthi accounting for 5.7%,148 belong to E. wendti accounting for 4.8%,143 belong to I. prosostomus accounting for 4.6%,126 belong to P. suillus accounting for 4.1%,64 belong to P. juanitae accounting for 2.1%,30 belong to I. sattleri accounting for 1.0%,15 belong to R. oberhaeuseri accounting for 0.5%. six belong to D. (D.) patanei accounting for 0.2%, two belong to D. (A.) scoticus accounting for 0.1%, three belong to D. (A.) triodon accounting for 0.1%,30 belong to D. (D.) pingue accounting for 1%,16 belong to M. tardigradum accounting for 5%.Nine hundred and forty-nine tardigradaes were collected from Mount Niutou,449 from Baxianzhai,121 from Luorendong,146 from Mount Huoyan,215 from Mount Xiangtou,300 from Mount Dataiyang,311 from Mount Shima,235 from Fenghuang, 232 from Mount Daliang,121 from Mount Tiechuan. More tardigrades were collected from the Mount Niutou, Baxianzhai, Mount Shima and Mount Dataiyang than from the Mount Tiechuan and Luorendong. The number of tardigrade species collected at each sampling site ranged from nine to twelve, indicating little difference of species diversity between sampling sites. However, there were significant differences of the numbers of specimen between the sampling sites, which might be related to the number of moss samples.