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Wesubscribetotheopinionthatspecies-specificcharactersofrotifersare
poorlydifferentiatedand,inmanyinstances,difficulttodescribe.Itwouldbethen
virtuallyimpossibletodevelopadichotomouskeytoallthespeciespresentin
Poland.Moreover,suchakeywouldbeusefulonlyforthosebiologistswhospe-
cialiseinrotifertaxonomy,andtheyusenumerousoriginalforeignsourcepapers
anyway(seeReferences).Becausethispublicationhastorovidenon-specialists
witharelativelysimpleanduser-friendlytool,wedecidedthatthebestsolution
wouldbetoputtogetherdescriptionsandfiguresofindividualspeciesandto
highlighttheirdistinguishingcharacteristics.Thespeciesarearrangedalphabet-
icallybytheirscientificnames.Foracorrectidentification,itisnecessarytouse
bothkeystofamiliesandgeneraandspeciesdescriptions.
Thosereaderswillingtoprobedeeperintothisunusualandsopoorlyknown
animaltaxonand,perhaps,todiscoverrotiferspeciesnewtoPoland,areencour-
agedtoperuseinformationcontainedinChapterVI.Itdealswithspecieswhich,
althoughknownfromtheneighbouringcountries,havenotbeenreportedfrom
Polandsofar.
Thosereaderswhoneedmoredetaileddataonindividualspeciesorwhoare
willingtogetacquaintedalsowiththerotifersthatdonotoccurinPolandare
advisedtoconsultkeystorotiferfamiliespublishedwithintheseries“Guides
totheIdentificationoftheMicroinvertebratesoftheContinentalWatersof
theWorld”(thevolumespublishedsofararelistedinReferences).Individual
volumesoftheseries,edited-since1992-byH.J.DumontofGhentUniversity
(Belgium),werewrittenbythemostprominentspecialistsinrotifertaxonomy
andecology,andareatpresentthemostcompleteandauthoritativesourceof
informationontheRotifera.Wewishtoaddthatboththetaxonomicpositionof
eachspeciesandthenomenclatureusedconformtoourcurrentopinions.Ifother
speciesandgenusnamesareencountered,itisadvisabletoconsultthelistof
synonyms(ChapterIX).
THEAUTHORS
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