Consumption rates of six species of marine benthic naked amoebae (gymnamoebia) from sediments in the Clyde Sea area

Six species of naked amoebae, ranging in size from 45 to 3258 mu m(3), were isolated from benthic sediments of the Clyde Sea area. The number of fluorescently labelled bacteria (FLB) consumed by these amoebae was determined at 5, 10, 15 and 20 degrees C. Consumption rates varied markedly, ranging from 0.2 to 194.7 bacteria h(-1) (equivalent to 0.16-155.8 mu m(3) bacterial biomass). However, only some of these values were considered to be optimal; several of the uptake values were too low to account for the measured growth rates of amoebae. Using the optimal consumption rate data, the mean specific rates increased from 0.042 bacteria h(-1) mu m(-3) at 5 degrees C to 0.131 bacteria h(-1) mu m(-3) at 20 degrees C. This is the first study to detail the ingestion rates of a range of bacterivorous marine gymnamoebae.