Fauna Europaea

What a nice site!

Information about - yes - Fauna Europaea. Works fast, quite clear to my opinion, nice taxonomic trees and maps - and a bunch of links to other on-line databases.

I was looking for a link to the Dutch taxa-database, the TWN-list, but it isn't there. Perhaps because it's in Dutch. At least what the phytoplankton concerns, it's quite wondeful. When do they go international?

Angry birds in a puddle

While cycling to an apple-blossom picnic, I stopped at a little puddle that looked very promising. Nice dark, water with pH around 5. I thought there might be some beautiful Desmids waiting for me. I filled the bottle, enjoyed the picnic under the blossoming apple trees with friends, good food and Irish songs - and waited anxiously till the next day, when I was ble to take a look at my sample.

And this is what I saw:


Don't they look like the famous Angry birds? I have never played the game, but I still haven't managed to walk through my life without paying any attention to them.

The whole sample was full with Synuras, a groep of golden algae.


Golden algae are nice too, but many of them not possible to identify with only a light microscope. One needs to have electron microscope photo's of the scales.

Next time I try to catch some pigs.


Literature

Kristiansen, J. & Preisig, H.R. (2007). Chrysophyte and Haptophyte algae. Part 2: Synurophyceae. In: Süßwasserflora von Mitteleuropa. Freshwater Flora of Central Europe. (Büdel, B., Gärtner, G., Krienitz, L., Preisig, H.R. & Schagerl, M. Eds) Vol.1, pp. [i-v], vi [vi-vii], 1-252. Berlin & Heidelberg: Spektrum Akademischer Verlag.

Starmach, K. (1985). Chrysophyceae und Haptophyceae. In: Süsswasserflora von Mitteleuropa. (Ettl, H., Gerloff, J., Heynig, H. & Mollenhauer, D. Eds) Vol.5, pp. 1-515. Stuttgart: Gustav Fischer.

The slender Planktothrix -species

Tricky, these slender Planktothrix -species.

But if they really are only 3 µm wide, have no particular features in end cells, no calyptra like Pl. prolifica, nor those characteristically elongated aerotopes like Pl. suspensa - then we are just stuck with the good old Plantktothrix agardhii. Sensu lato that is.

In lugol preserved samples the red color - which would reveal the true nature of Pl. profilica - can not either be observed.

So, to be on the safe side it's better to call it Planktothrix cf. agardhii.


Literature:
KOMÁREK J. & ANAGNOSTIDIS K. (2005): Cyanoprokaryota 2. Teil/ 2nd Part: Oscillatoriales. - In: BÜDEL B., KRIENITZ L., GÄRTNER G. & SCHAGERL M. (eds): Süsswasserflora von Mitteleuropa 19/2, Elsevier/Spektrum, Heidelberg, 759 pp.

Pseudotetraëdriella kamillae

It is there. In different Finnish waters, this tiny little thing.

Hegewald, Padisák, and Friedl (2007) found that this little thing differed markedly from other look-a-like algae and give a firm description of the differences in their article. A new family - Loboceae E. Hegewald - and a new genus - Pseudoteraëdriella Hegewald - was established in the Class Eustigmatophyceae Hibberd - and look: Pseudotetraëdriella kamillae Hegewald & Padisák had found it's place in the taxonomic tree.

One might easily overlook it. Or mix it with Tetraëdron minimum or Tetraëdriella jovetii, but it is different. First of all, it's very small - only 3-7 µm. Secondly it only has one (or two in older cells) chloroplast. It has no pyrenoid and the cell wall is smooth.

The green algae Tetraëdron minimum, on the other hand is, first of all, very green and it does have a pyrenoid. The size is about the same. Skuja (1948) has a nice drawing of Tetraëdron minimum var. tetralobulatum from Uppland, Sweden, which resembles our Pseudotetraëdriella kamillae quite a lot, but again - that pyrenoid.

Hindák (1980) describes even a smaller Tetraëdron, only 2-4 µm, which he calls mediocris, found in a fishpond near the beautiful city of Bratislava. This one still has the pyrenoid and it's much more tetrahedrical than our little P. kamillae. Not that I would have seen Tetraëdron mediocris alive and kicking - or even lugolised- no, not here in Finland.

Pseudotetraëdriella kamillae has lobes, but they are not as much twisted as in Tetraëdriella jovetii, a yellow-green (Xanhtophyceae) algae, size 10-12 µm, with 5-9 chloroplasts, no pyrenoid and a smooth cell wall.

Look now how very different they are:

Pseudotetraëdriella kamillae

Tetraëdriella jovetii



For further study:
Literature:
Hegewald, E., Padisák, J. & Friedl, T. (2007): Pseudotetraëdriella kamillae: taxonomy and ecology of a new member of the algal class Eustigmatophyceae (Stramenopiles). - Hydrobiologia 586: 107-116.

Hindák, F. (1980): Studies on the chlorococcal algae (Chlorophyceae). II. - In:Ruzicka, M. (red.). Biologické Práce 26 (6). VEDA Vydavatelstvo Slovenskej Akadémie Vied / VEDA Publishing House of the Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava, 195 + (1) pp., incl. 73 pls.

Komárek, J. & Fott, B. (1983): Chlorophyceae (Grünalgen). Ordnung: Chlorococcales. - In: G. Huber-Pestalozzi (†). Das Phytoplankton des Süßwassers. Systematik und Biologie. 7. Teil, 1. Hälfte. In: Elster, H.-J. & Ohle, W. (red.). Die Binnengewässer. Einzeldarstellungen aus der Limnologie und ihren Nachbargebieten. Band XVI. E. Schweizerbart’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung (Nägele u. Obermiller), Stuttgart. X + 1044 pp., incl. 253 pls. ISBN 3-510-40023-2.

Skuja, A. (1948). Taxonomie des Phytoplanktons einiger Seen in Uppland, Schweden. Symbolae Botanicae Upsalienses 9(3): 1-399.

Co-operation rules!

Wonderful!
A combination of passions: Adventurers and Scientists for Conservation.

Fighting algae with algae

An Indian company NUALGI NANOBIOTECH makes the product "Nualgi" to solve a wide range of problems:
* to boost the growth of prawns and fishes in aquaculture ponds
* to treat sewagewater, polluted and effluent waters and to reduce COD, BOD, color and bad odour in them
* to prevent growth of toxic algal species called 'red tides' in the sea
and even
* to absorb global carbon dioxide and reduce greenhouse gases thereby solving global warming problem.

All this is done by our little friends, the algae. In this case specifically the diatom algae. The idea is to stimulate the growth of the diatoms, so that they will be the winners in the growing competition, not the blue-green algae or other nuisance algae. This is done by "micro nutrients in the form of nano particles which triggers the growth of diatoms (algae) in the water body, and not any other form of algae" as the company tells on their web page. Yes, I can see the question marks rising...

It seems to work, according to the company's reports, of course. And there is nothing wrong with the central idea. It's just that this engineer-like approach does not do justice to the wonderful complexity of the nature. The sum of two things can be very much more than an engineer can imagine. And therefore one should be quite careful before throwing something like this in to the nature in great amounts. Who knows what would happen, if one uses something like this on a really big scale - let's say in an ocean? None of us.

Nature is far more ingenious than any team of engineers. Just accept it. And have respect for it.

ANSP / NAWQA / EPA 2011 Diatom and Non-Diatom Taxa

This week there was a message from both DIATOM-L and ALGAE-L about a set of taxa names they have been developing in USA: http://diatom.ansp.org/nawqa/Taxalist.aspx.

Makes me wonder about the cleverness in making all kinds of - more or less taxonomically correct - algae lists in different countries. When does the dawn of international algae lists break through? Nordic Microalage has made a nice start. But a larger European co-operation on this subject would not be harmful. Not to talk bout the rest of the world. Step by step...

Do take a look at the rest of the pages of the Phycology Section, Patrick Center for Environmental Research. Interesting. Nice photo's, although one can't see all of them without logging in.

A cordial blue-green algae

They really are heart shaped, the cells of of the blue-green algae Gomphosphaeria:

Although it's not as nicely visible here as in Joostens (2006) book, see page 153.

This is the type species Gomphosphaeria aponina, because it has a thin, yet very clear layer enveloping the individual cells:

There used to be a lot of different Gomphosphaeria-species, but then - in 1980's - misters Komárek and Hindák took a closer look at these species and divided three genera out of this group: Gomphosphaeria Kützing 1836, Woronichinia Elenkin 1933 and Snowella Elenkin 1938.

They also mention the genus Coelosphaerium Nägeli 1849 as a member of the subfamily Gomphosphaerioideae. Coelosphaerium differs from the rest because there are no stalks inside the colony.

Joosten (2006) on the other hand thinks that "possibly only a single genus is justified" (p. 128) for all these four genera. But, as he also says, for such a drastic revision we shall have to wait for the results of molecular studies.

Which again have a tiny obstacle in the fact that these species are difficult to cultivate (Komárek & Hindák 1988). Maybe a friendly "Good morning" to the cultures every morning would help here too, as Komárek told us during the blue-green course last summer, was (one of) the secret(s) of the Japanese culturing Aphanizomenon so succesfully?



Literature
Joosten, A.M.T 2006. Flora of the blue-green algae of the Netherlands. I The non filamentous species of inland waters. KNNV Publishing, Utrecht. 239 s.

Komárek, J., Anagnostidis, K. 1999. Cyanoprokaryota, 1.Teil: Chroococcales. In: Ettl H., Gärtner G., Heynigh H., Mollenhauer D. (ed.). Süsswasserflora von Mitteleuropa Band 19/1.

Komárek J, & Hindák F. 1988. Taxonomic review of natural populations of the cyanophytes from the Gomphosphaeria-complex. Arch. Hydrobiol. Suppl. 80, 1-4. Algolocigal Studies 50-53. 203-225.

Brown beans

I saw these brown beans hanging on a Tabellaria today:

and was wondering, what was this again..? Being sure I had seen a picture like this somewhere I tried to recall in which book. Was it in the Yellow-green algae (Xanthophyceae) book? Or was it in the Green algae book (Chlorophyceae, Chlorococcales) from Komárek the Great and Fott the Fine? Or perhaps in the Dinophyceae book??

There is something that makes one think about the Xanthophyceae: the thick, transparent walls and even some red oil dops. But the color is very dark... and it looked like they did not put much too much lugol in the sample when they took it. The dark color is not very Xanthophyceae- or Chlorophyceae -like. But it is characteristic to Dinophyceae.

And yes, there it was! In the Family Dinococcaceae Fott 1960, together with four other genera were the pictures of species in the genus Dinococcus, that I had in mind. This was in the Süsswasseflora von Mitteleuropa 6, that was written by Jiří Popovský and Lois Ann Pfiester (notice all the stripes and carons I managed to get in it this time!) back in 1990, an ocean of time if one looks at the development in the field of algae taxonomy.

Checked some sites for the taxonomy of this genus. algaeBASE puts Dinococcus in the Class Dinophyceae, the Order Phytodiniales and further in the Family Phytodiniaceae. The Dutch TWN-list gives only Dinophyceae incertae sedis. Even worse result was found on ITIS, (Integrated Taxonomic Information System) where the whole genus is missing. Does it has a synonyme in ITIS? Or why is it not there?

Back to the Green and Yellow-green algae. There are some species, that very much look like these brown beans of today. Like in the green algae genus Bicuspidella Pascher 1932 or in the genus Dioxys Pascher in the Yellow-green algae. Information from the books that are more tha 20 years old... yes, I know... I must go and read some more recent literature.


Literature
Ettl, Hanuš 1978. Xanthophyceae 1. Teil. In.: Ettl H., Gerloff J., Heynigh H. (ed.). Süsswasserflora von Mitteleuropa Band 3. Gustav Fischer Verlag, Stuttgart, New York. 530 s.

Komárek J., Fott B.1983 Chlorophyceae (Grünalgen), Ordnung Chlorococcales. In: Huber-Pestalozzi G. (Ed.): Das Phytoplankton des Süsswassers, Die Binnengewässer 16, 7/1: 1-1044, Schweizerbart Verlag, Stuttgart 1983.

Popovský Jiří, Lois Ann Pfiester 1990. Dinophyceae (Dinoflagellida). In: Ettl H., Gerloff J., Heynigh H., Mollenhauser D. (ed.). Süsswasserflora von Mitteleuropa Band 6. Gustav Fischer Verlag, Jena, Stuttgart. 272s.

Coastal Phytoplankton - a book

The Photo Guide for Northern European Seas, Coastal Phytoplankton book from Alexandra Kraberg, Marcus Baumann and Claus-Dieter Dürselen is worth taking a look in.

The size is handy, the photo's are fine, the quality of paper very good. It has nice, clear drawings to clarify the different structures in plankton organisms. Every species has one whole page for itself, with mostly good photos and drawings. Furthermore on top of every page you can find a bulk of information of the species in a very concentrated, yet not in a cluttered manner.

Very handy are the tips about the similar species. When identifying the algae, it's always good to know who is lurking round the corner, trying to look just like the one you have in your microscope field of view. If this information about the similar species isn't enough, take a look in the end, where you find quite some taxonomic references.

I have not had the chance to try the book out in real life, but I think the concept is good. Although an electrical version would perhaps also be convenient.

When do they make a book like this about the Baltic Sea phytoplankton?


KRABERG, Alexandra, Marcus BAUMANN & Claus-Dieter DÜRSELEN:
Coastal Phytoplankton
Photo Guide for Northern European Seas

2010. [in English] – 204 pp., 190 coloured and 24 black-and-white figures (c 388 coloured and 88 black-and-white photos and drawings), 4 tables.
24 x 21 cm. Paperback.

ISBN 978-3-89937-113-0

Chrysosporum

Tastes good, that name. Chrysosporum - a golden seed. Does not take one's thoughts directly to the for so many odious world of the cyanobacteria, but that is the right address anyway.

The young Czech cyano-researcher, Eliska Zapomelova (sorry about the missing characters in your name - I not a master enough over my keyboard to be able to produce them by myself and a simple copy-paste did not work this time) with her colleagues writes in an interesting article in Hydrobiologia about the new genus Chrysosporum, which is - as we can read - based on the further research on our old friend Anabaena bergii. Which again is - as far as I know - not recorded here in Finland. At least it's not on the official algae lists. According to Zapomelova and her colleagues, this species has a kind of a golden coat on it's akinete, which explanis the choice of the beautiful name. Want to see.

The rest of the article describes a few cyano's that are recorded for the first time in the Czech Republic. There seems to be an invasion going on. Or is it just the lack of our knowledge till now on? Anyway, it would be very interesting to see what all kind of cyanobacteria there are really living here, in the Finnish waters. I bet there would be a couple of new species, not only for the Finnish algae list, but who knows for the whole scientific world, if one looks closely enough.

The catch of the day

Took a ride to Lövö today.

Went to the water near the old ferry point and took a sample. Back at the office I saw some fine, common spring algae of the Baltic Sea, like this Nitzschia frigida :

Nice to see some fresh algae again, after all those lugol samples.

Baltic Sea phytoplankton taxa

Wuuh, what did I find now!!? The famous Guy Hällfors Baltic Sea Phytoplankton Checklist in Excel form! Now it's possible to do all kinds of things with this data.

There is a link at the Baltic Sea Portal to this page. When using Opera, you'll get this message: "Unable to complete secure transaction". But, they did kindly advice you to use IE 8 or Mozilla, didn't you read that! Ok. Mozilla then. But still, before you get to see this treasure, you have accept the page. Because when you click the link, you get the message "Security certificate is expired". It should be safe, though... I contacted the Balti Sea Portal and they adviced me to accept it. I still do wonder why this goody is hidden here, behind all these barriers?

Bingo!

Just started to take a look at the Baltic Sea phytoplankton for real. And in the first field of view I see this funny thing, that you would not see in the fresh water samples:

Well, this is perhaps a more estetically justified photo of the same thing:

Now you see only the skeleton.

This is Ebria tripartita (J.H.K. Schumann, 1867) E.J. Lemmermann, 1899, 25x30 µm.

Ok, I admit. It's not phytoplankton. It's a heterotrophic flagellate, a member of "an enigmatic group of eukaryotes with an unclear phylogenetic position" as Hoppenrath & Leander (2006) so elegantly put it. But it is counted in the phytoplankton biomonitoring, so I accept it.

The strange thing with this species is that it has an endoskeleton. So it's a bit like us, humans. Also the name, which has it's origin in the latin word "ebrius" meaning "drunken", sounds -at least in the Finnish ears - very human.

But then again it has other features that resemble Dinoflagellates, like the nucleus, on the other hand it has features that makes one think of golden algae. Even for the taxonomists this has been most confusing. Ebria has been wandering across the taxonomic field, from one corner to the other, like not many other species have. A nice description of these adventures can be read in Hoppenrath & Leander (2006), who finally placed the species in protista, in the division Cercozoa.

Ebria tripartita is a species, that has a tremendous long history. It has been found in the sediments of the Baltic, in the depths that correspond with time some 120 000 years ago (Korhola & Grönlund, 1999). Yes. 120 000.

And not only is it widespread in time, it actually swims all over the world too (Tomas (ed.) 1997, Hoppenrath & Leander 2006).





Literature:
Ikävalko, Johanna (1998). Further observations on Flagellates within sea ice in northern Bothnian Bay, the Baltic Sea. Polar Biol 19: 323-329.

Korhola, Atte & Grönlund, Tuulikki (1999) Observations of Ebria tripartita (Schumann) Lemmermann in Baltic sediments. Journal of Paleolimnology 21: 1–8.

Hoppenrath, Mona & Leander, Brian S. (2006) Ebriid Phylogeny and the Expansion of the Cercozoa. Protist, Vol. 157, 279—290.

H. R. Preisig (1994) Siliceous structures and silicification in flagellated protists. Protoplasma 181: 29- 42.

Carmelo R. Tomas (ed.) (1997). Identifying marine phytoplankton. Academic Press. 858 p.

The Baltic Dinoflagellates

Spent Friday in the capitol, Helsinki. Visited Dr. Anke Kremp, a senior researcher at the Marine Research Centre/Modelling and Innovations Unit of the at the Finnish Environment Institute (SYKE) and listened with joy to all the things she had to tell about the Dinoflagellates in the Baltic Sea: the species recorded there, identification, taxonomy and the recent changes in taxonomy.

Because of the brackish water in the Baltic Sea and the gradual changes of salinity along the Finnish coast the species assemblage has its very own character. A checklist of the Baltic phytoplankton was published in revised form in 2004 by Guy Hällfors - a list that is very useful, not least because it has a very extensive list of synonyms, older names of the species. The taxonomy of Dinoflagellates has changed a lot since 2004 and because Hällfors "tried to avoid the inflation of higher taxa", this publication in not The One for the up-to-date names. For more recent names one can look at the wonderful The Center of Excellence for Dinophyte Taxonomy.

In Hällfors' Checklist we find 83 species that are recorded in the Finnish parts of the Baltic sea, that is the Northern Baltic Proper, the Gulf of Finland, the Archipelago Sea, The Botnian Sea and the Botnian Bay. Most of them are in the orders Peridiniales (31) and Gymnodiniales (29).

Only 83 species. It should then not be extremely difficult to learn to know most of them. On the paper at least. In lugol samples the visibility of the critical features of Dinoflagellates is, of course, somewhat limited.

If one looks very carefully, who knows one finds some new ones too? :) But before doing the dance of joy in a state of euphoria it's better to contact a real expert. I'm looking forward to getting to know the Baltic Dino's better!

Biodiversity Heritage Library

What a wonderful place to be, this BHL! Here they have quite nice quality of pictures too. Just take a look at the original drawing of Microcystis parasitica. Not bad.

You can search in many different ways: General / Books/Journals / Authors / Subjects / Scientific Names / Citation Finder (BETA) or browse by Titles | Authors | Subjects | Map | Year | Collections. Searched for Microcystis parasitica and got 21 publications! With a direct link to the PAGE where this species was mentioned. Unbelievable! And it's fast. Or maybe it's just that the rest of the village is not hanging on the net right now...

They also have a Facebook site, where they say that their Mission is "The participating libraries have over two million volumes of biodiversity literature collected over 200 years to support the work of scientists, researchers, and students in their home institutions and throughout the world."

I love you. ♥

BioTar

A new interesting project has started in Finland: BioTar - Development of biological monitoring methods for the effects of the use of peat lands. The abbreviation BioTar comes from the words Biological, of course and Tarkkailu (=monitoring). The ending "-tar" means a female person in Finnish, so altogether the name gives an impression - at least to this Finnish mind - of a green, fairylike spirit leading the study.

The aim of the study, that takes place between 2011 and 2014, is to find new, innovative and cost effective methods to estimate the the ecological state of the water near peat lands. I wonder if they have included desmids in their list of interesting indicators? Desmids are often very sensitive for changes in, for example, electrical conductivity, which will probably occur if someone begins to harvest peat. In the Netherlands desmids has been used as indicators for Water Framework Directive, take a look at http://www.koemanenbijkerk.nl/uploads/poster-sieralg.pdf.

The study will be done by the Finland’s environmental administration and the university of Oulu. The ones skilled in the Finnish language can find more information on http://www.ymparisto.fi/default.asp?contentid=404440&lan=FI.

Euglenaria

Well, this is getting difficult! What we till now on were happy and content to call Euglena actually includes two groups of organisms, that have to be placed in two different genera: Euglena and the new Euglenaria. Euglenaria means Euglena-like.

And they certainly are, Euglena-like. For Euglenaria's are morphologically indistinguishable from the "old" Euglena's. The difference of these taxa lies in the genes, far beyond the resolving power of the microscope.

The difficulty for a regular plankton counter is, that if one can't identify a taxon to a specific Euglena-species, one has to jump one stick upwards on the taxonomic ladder and call the taxon Euglenophyceae. This is something a true algae counter does not like.

So say farewell to these species, that earlier could have been called Euglena ssp, but now have to be referred as Euglenophyceae:

It's frustrating, because they are clearly not Strombomonas or Phacus, for example, which are other genera in the Class Euglenophyceae. It would be satisfying to be able to make this difference clear in the algae lists too. But what to do? Make a notation, of course. But further? Call them Euglenophyceae Euglena vetus?

Literature:
Eric W. Linton, Anna Karnkowska-Ishikawa, Jong Im Kim, Woongghi Shin, Mathew S. Bennett, Jan Kwiatowski, Bozena Zakrys, and Richard E. Triemer (2010). Reconstructing Euglenoid Evolutionary RelationshipsusingThreeGenes: Nuclear SSU and LSU,and Chloroplast SSU rDNA Sequences and the Descriptionof Euglenaria gen. nov.
(Euglenophyta). Protist, Vol.161,603–619, October 2010.

Remote sensing

Kari Kallio defended earlier today his thesis on remote sensing in boreal lakes at the university of Helsinki. I wasn't there, but I took a glimpse at his thesis. Very interesting developments in technical apparatus, indeed. In a country like Finland with thousands of lakes it sure would be handy to be able to get results of many, many lakes without much effort. But. We are not there yet. A lot of algorithms still need to be calibrated. And algae counted. :)


Literature
Kallio, Kari 2012. Water quality estimation by optical remote sensing
in boreal lakes. Monographs of the Boreal Environment Research, No. 39.

Mytilopsis leucophaeata in the Finnish Archipelago

So, now it's confirmed. Conrad’s false mussel has been seen in the South-West Archipel area. Earlier this for Finland alien species was observed in the eastern part of the Gulf of Finland, near Loviisa, like they tell us on the Baltic Sea Portal http://www.itameriportaali.fi/en/tietoa/tulokaslajit/en_GB/mytilopsis_leu/.

And today, they told in YLE news that this Mytilopsis leucophaeta has reached - or otherwise come to - Airisto. It took an American reseacher, Amy Fowler, to find them. At the university of Turku they verified the species using DNA-techniques. This little mussel looks so much like the very common Zebra mussel (Dreissena polymorpha), that it's not really easy to just look at it and greet it with it's right name.

The scientists of course want to know what are the effects of this newcomer on the Baltic Sea ecosystem? Mostly one immediately fears for negative effects, but just some time ago Joanna Norkko from Åbo Akademi and her colleagues found out, that another invasive species (polychaete worms, Marenzelleria spp) has had a very positive effect on the near bottom oxygen conditions in the Northern Baltic Sea, like they write in Global Change Biology

Planktic long bone

Eunotia zasuminensis (Cabejsz.) Körner 1970 is a rather rare diatom species with star-like colonies. It resemlbles the familiar Asterionella and is probably often identified under this name.

E. zasuminensis differs from Asterionella in the form of the cells. Where Asterionella formosa particularly has cells where one end is much smaller than the other, in E. zasuminensis both ends are quite the same size. But in the middle there is a little bubble. Actually it looks very much like the humerus, the long bow in one's arm. Of course you have to see the Eunotia cell from the valve face.

If you can't see the humerus shape and are hesitating wether to call it E. zasuminensis or Asterionella, take a look at the chloroplasts. In Asterionella there are many little chloroplasts after each other, in E. zasuminensis there are fewer, bigger chloroplasts and they are closer to each other:

Asternionella formosa.

Eunotia zasuminensis.

This species has been moving a bit in the house of Taxonomy, as Eloranta writes in his article (see below). It was originally placed in the genus Fragilaria by Cabejszekowna (1937). Lundh-Almestrand (1954) again moved it to the genus Asterionella, while Körner in 1970 finally gave it a place in the genus Eunotia, because it really does have a raphe, albeit a tiny one. The first two genera are members of the class Fragilariophyceae - the ones without a raphe. Eunotia is a member of tha class Bacillariophyceae.


You want to know more? Take a look at Eloranta's article: Eloranta, P. (1986) Melosira distans var. tenella and Eunotia zasuminensis, two poorly known planktonic diatoms in Finnish lakes. Nordic Journal of Botany
Volume 6, Issue 1, pages 99–103.

Or if you are as fortunate as being able to understand Finnish, you can visit the Finnish plankton guide on the net: http://www.jyu.fi/bio/kasviplankton/uusin/index.php

Literature:
Cabejszekowna, I. (1937) Fragilaria zasuminensis n. sp. w jeziorze Zasuminskim na Pollesiu. Arch. Hydrobiolö Rybactwa 10: 423-425.
Lundh-Almestrand, A. (1954) Some remarks on Fragilaria zasuminensis. Bot. Notiser 1954 (2): 179-182.
Körner, H. (1970) Morphologie und Taxonomie der Diatomeegattung Asterionella. Nova Hedwigia 20 (3-4): 557-724.

The one with the warts

As a good start for a new plankton year I had the pleasure of meeting Crucigenia mucronata in the Dutch waters. Quite a rare species, but easy to recognize because of the warts. As the name says - mucro (Latin) = point, wart.

Size of the cells: 5x7,5 µm.

It is mentioned on the Dutch TWN-list, so it must have been seen in the Netherlands earlier. Komárek and Fott (1983) list France, Guadeloupe (who has been there collecting algae!?), India and Iowa in the USA as places where it has been recorded. They also tell us that the species like eutrophic water.

In Algaebase we can see that also Spain and Portugal can be added to this list of places of observation. Probably Germany too, because the Dutch TWN-list mentions as literature for this species also Tsarenko's and Krienitz's study on the coccal green algae of lake Tollensee, Germany. Unfortunately I don't have this article. Yet.

In Europe the species is further also recorded at least in Poland (Kozak et al 2007). It is not on the Finnish phytoplankton list.

Some surfing on the net gave also result in Taiwan.

Have you seen this little fellow?

Literature
Cambra Sánchez, J., Álvarez Cobelas, M. & Aboal Sanjurjo, M. (1998). Lista florística y bibliográfica de los clorófitos (Chlorophyta) de la Península Ibérica, Islas Baleares e Islas Canarias. pp. 1-614. Burgos: Asociación Española de Limnología.

Komárek, J. & Fott, B. (1983): Chlorophyceae (Grünalgen). Ordnung: Chlorococcales. - In: G. Huber-Pestalozzi (†). Das Phytoplankton des Süßwassers. Systematik und Biologie. 7. Teil, 1. Hälfte. In: Elster, H.-J. & Ohle, W. (red.). Die Binnengewässer. Einzeldarstellungen aus der Limnologie und ihren Nachbargebieten. Band XVI. E. Schweizerbart’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung (Nägele u. Obermiller), Stuttgart. X + 1044 pp., incl. 253 pls. ISBN 3-510-40023-2.

Kozak, A., Gołdyn R., Tymek, K. (2007). Long-term changes in the phytoplankton of a shallow storage reservoir. International Journal of Oceanography and Hydrobiology. Vol. XXXVI, Supplement 1. (87-93)

Tsarenko, P.M. & Krienitz, L. (1997). The flora of coccal green algae of Lake Tollensee and its tributaries (Baltic Lake District, Germany). – Archiv für Hydrobiologie / Supplementband 120, Algological Studies 86: 91-106.