Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dsjbd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T23:08:00.235Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The ciliary current of Phallusia [Ascidiacea] and the squirting of sea squirts

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 May 2009

D. B. Carlisle
Affiliation:
Ministry of Overseas Development, London

Extract

Filtration rates for Phallusia were computed from the rate of clearance of sus-pensions of colloidal graphite and of the flagellate Isochrysis. Rates varied from 825 ml./h to 5100 ml./h for animals between 8 and 128 g wet weight (40–336 ml./h/g wet weight; 88–570 ml./h/mg nitrogen). The greater part of this current is ciliary; less than 2 % is accounted for by squirting. Squirting thus plays but a minor role in maintaining the feeding current. Its probable function is perhaps more comparable with the expulsion of pseudofaeces in filter-feeding molluscs.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom 1966

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Goldberg, E. D., Mcblair, W. & Taylor, K. M., 1951. The uptake of vanadium by tunicates. Biol. Bull., mar. biol. Lab. Woods Hole, Vol. 101, pp. 8494.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hecht, S., 1916. The water current produced by Ascidia atra Lesueur. J. exp. Zool., Vol. 20, pp. 429–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hoyle, G., 1953. Spontaneous squirting of an ascidian, Phallusia mammillata Cuvier. J. mar. biol. Ass. U.K., Vol. 31, pp. 541–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jørgensen, C. B., 1949. Feeding-rates of sponges, lamellibranchs and ascidians. Nature, Lond., Vol. 163, p. 912.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jørgensen, C. B., 1955. Quantitative aspects of filter-feeding in invertebrates. Biol. Rev., Vol. 30, pp. 391454.CrossRefGoogle Scholar