A Comparison of the Gill Surface Areas of Two Sympatric Species of Fairy Shrimp (Anostraca, Crustacea)

Abstract

The hypothesis that active crustaceans have larger gill surfaces/unit body size than less active ones was tested with species of Anostraca. When compared to body volume and to dry body weight, total gill surface areas of planktonic existing Eubranchipus holmani were approximately 1.5 times larger than those of benthic existing E. vernalis. These results support the above hypothesis.