ADDITIONAL RECORDS: From soil collected at Spragg Bush Track, Waitakere Range, New Zealand, 26 December 1988; from moss collected at Sharp Track, Waitakere Range, New Zealand, December 1988; from organic debris collected at Department of Scientific and Industrial Research (DSIR), Auckland, New Zealand, March 1989.

The conidiophores of this species (Figs. 1, 3, 4) are seldom more than 100 µm tall and 2.0-2.5 µm wide. They are septate, hyaline, and simple or more often with one or two lateral branches. Phialides are solitary, in pairs, or less often in groups of three. Phialides are long and slender and 14-22 µm long, with a swollen basal segment and 2.0-2.3 µm at their widest point which tapers sharply to a narrow, elongate, slightly tapered apex. The upper portion of the phialide is not markedly reflexed or undulate as in some species of the genus but tends to be curved gently upwards. Aphanophialides are common, more or less cylindrical, very narrow, and 5.5-11.0 µm long by 0.6-0.8 µm wide. The phialoconidia (Figs. 4, 6) are nonseptate, hyaline, globose, and 3.3-3.8 µm in diameter. In side view, the narrow attachment point can sometimes be seen. Aleuriospores (Fig. 2) are globose to subglobose, often irregularly lobed, thick walled, hyaline to subhyaline, muriform, and 12-16.5 by 12-18 µm. As many as 10 aleuriospores develop from each infected rotifer, with an average of between 6and7.
In shallow water (not more than a few hundred micrometres deep) most Rotiferophthora species produce aleuriospores terminally on short, unbranched hyphae. . Some hyphae grow upwardly from the infected rotifer to the surface of the water where they break through the surface and produce conidiophores, conidiogenous cells, and conidia in the air. In general, conidia are not produced under water in Rotiferophthora. Although I have sometimes observed conidiophores and conidia developing under water, it is possible that the conidiophores were initiated in air prior to submersion. In R. globospora, conidiophores were never observed under water, but in deeper water (several millimetres) a single hypha frequently grew upwards, eventually broke through to the air, and produced a solitary conidiophore. Several such hyphae were observed to be nearly 1000 µm long.
Observations showed that as for other species of Rotiferophthora, the conidia of the parasite were ingested and lodged in the alimentary tract between the mouth and the mastax. After lodging, the conidia germinated to produce an extremely narrow germination tube (Fig. 5) that penetrated into the soft interior of the rotifer where it broadened to produce the lobed, branching assimilative hyphae.

HABITAT: Parasitic in bdelloid rotifers.

Conidiophora brevia, hyalina, usque ad 100 µm alta x 2.0-2.2(2.5) µm lata, simplica vel exigue ramosa; phialides solitariae vel geminatae, verticillatae infrequenter, 14-17(22) µm longae x 2.0-2.3(2.5) µm catae, cum parte basilari tumida et attenuata gradatim usque ad angustum apicem cylindricum et elongatum; aphanophialides frequenter, teretiusculae, 5.5-11 µm longae x 0.6-0.8 µm catae; phialoconidia globosa 3.3-3.6(3.8) µm in diametro; aleuriosporae globosae vel subglobosae, lobatae irregulariter, 12-16.5 x 12-18.0 µm.

TYPE: Slides in herbarium (OAC 10850), isolated from mossy soil, Castle Rock Trail, Coromandel, New Zealand, 15 November 1988.