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Water Flea — printable fact sheet
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Water Flea
Daphnia pulex
Daphnia, the water flea, is not a flea but a small planktonic crustacean, and it is one of the most instructive animals in freshwater biology. It reproduces by cyclical parthenogenesis: in good conditions the population is entirely female and clonal, each mother producing geneti…
Did you know?
- Daphnia can enter a dormant state by producing hardy eggs that survive harsh conditions, allowing populations to persist even in temporary water bodies.
- Whether a Daphnia is male or female is decided by its environment, not its genes, so genetically identical clones can be either sex. If it smells a predator, its offspring grow defensive helmets, spines and neck teeth that they would never otherwise develop. Its dormant eggs survive in lake sediment for a century or more, and researchers hatch them to compare ancient populations directly with modern ones. Its genome contains around 31,000 genes, more than the human genome.
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