#rotifera

[bogleech]

My tabletop roleplaying setting, Mortasheen, will be available to purchase for a limited time beginning on Halloween, 2025. Until then, bonus supplementary monsters will be going up every day of October. DAY 01/31: BRAINSLARK

Click the link for Brainslark's extensive lore, concept/design notes, and gameplay stats constructed by @gutsygills, art and writing by me.

About Mortasheen's Halloween soft-release

The history of the Mortasheen project and game

About the Mortasheen world

[bestanimal]

Round 1 - Phylum Rotifera

(Sources - 1, 2, own work, 4)

Rotifera is a phylum of microscopic and near-microscopic animals, commonly called Wheel Animals or Wheel Animalcules. Many are an important part of freshwater zooplankton.

Rotifers are common in freshwater throughout the world, with a few marine species. They range from 50 micrometres to over 2 millimeters, though most are around 0.1 to 0.5 mm long. Boasting a large amount of diversity, some rotifers are free-swimming, others move by inchworming along the ground, some are sessile and live inside tubes of gelatin attached to the substrate, and some live in sessile or planktonic colonies (seen in gif below). Rotifers are great little recyclers, feeding on detritus, dead bacteria, algae, and protozoans, eating particles up to 10 micrometres in size. They are also prey for many animals, including copepods, fish, bryozoans, comb jellies, true jellies, starfish, and tardigrades. Their fossils have been found in Devonian and Permian fossil beds.

Rotifers are sexually dimorphic, with females always being larger than males, if males of the species even exist at all. Male rotifers’ main lot in life is reproduction: they do not usually have a functional digestive system, and many are already sexually fertile at birth. The female has one or two ovaries, and releases eggs through a cloaca. Male rotifers have a penis which they either insert into the female’s cloaca, or use to inject sperm straight through her skin. Most species hatch as miniature versions of the adult. Females grow rapidly, reaching their adult size within a few days, while many males do not grow at all. Their lifespan lasts from a few days to a few weeks.

This poll also includes the parasitic Acanthocephala (4th image), or “Thorny/Spiny-headed Worms” which was once considered to be a discrete phylum but have since been found to be highly modifed rotifers, so I am including them in this phylum. Acanthocephalans have complex life cycles, involving many hosts.

How do you feel about this phylum?

One or more of my favorite animals is in this phylum

I love one or more of these animals

I like one or more of these animals

I am neutral about all of these animals

I dislike all of these animals

I hate all of these animals

Voting ended onSep 18, 2024

Propaganda under the cut:

If you’ve ever done freshwater microscopy you’ve probably seen one of these little guys.

Rotifers are a major food source for many species and also contribute to the decomposition of organic matter in soil.

Because they’re so good at recycling detritus, rotifers are sometimes used in fish tanks to help clean the water.

One species, Cephalodella vittata, only lives in Russia’s giant Lake Baikal.

In 2021, biologists were able to restore bdelloid rotifers that had been frozen for 24,000 years in Siberian permafrost!

Some acanthocephalans cause acanthocephaliasis in humans. The earliest known infection was found in a prehistoric man in Utah, dated to around 160 BC.

[bacony-cakes]

thinkin about anthro rotifers

this girl lives in your local body of freshwater

[animalshowdown]

Phylum Round 1

🦠 ROTIFERA vs. KINORHYNCHA 🦠

Rotifera

Kinorhyncha

Voting ended onJan 28, 2024

Rotifera: Wheel Animals. Mostly freshwater with some saltwater species, and can live in the water column, within the sediment, or attached to hard surfaces. Some Rotifers even live within the thin layer of moisture covering mosses. Their most distinctive feature is their corona and tentacles, which, when feeding, look like a rotating wheel. Their bodies are entirely soft except for the small jaw-like structures in their throats that help them chew their food. As detritivores, they are important contributors to the nitrogen cycle and breaking down dead organic matter.

Kinorhyncha: Mud Dragons. Kinorhynchs are meiofauna, meaning they live in the spaces between grains of sand. They are segmented and have sets of spines along the body. These spines are used to move through the sediment, gripping individual sand grains as the body moves forward. A crown of spines around the head frames the mouth, which is full of sharp toothlike spines. Although little is known about their life cycle, research has shown that mother Kinorhynchs wrap each egg in a protective layer of mud and dead organic matter until the young hatch.

[cuicuit]

Bdelloid rotifer eating

This little animal uses its ciliae rings to aspire water, then it grinds it with its mastax organ. It mostly eats organic detritus and other microorganisms.

[ilikevintagebooks]

Tardigrade, Rotifera, Anguillula

-The Universe 1873

[amateurplant]

Not plants but I wanted to try posting something different! I spend a lot of time behind a microscope (both at school and at home), here’s a rotifer and a gastrotrich I found recently in some old aquarium water I got from a friend.

[chameleocoonj]

microorganism giorno who