Ptenothrix

Welcome all, to the wonderful world of springtails. This site documents a project of trying to learn about, identify, and eventually scientifically describe all the species of Ptenothrix springtails in coastal British Columbia, Canada.

What’s a springtail? It’s a tiny non-insect hexapod that typically lives in or on soil or plants. They play a big role in many ecosystems as “clean-up crew”, often eating fungus that grows as part of a decay cycle. They’re often studied as an indicator of soil or forest health, and there’s still a lot we can learn about them.

Amongst the springtails, there are basically 3 body plans: long-and-skinny, bumpy-and-chubby, and then round bois. Our heroes, the Ptenothrix, are round “globular” springtails, and are actually among the biggest springtails around, small as they are.

On the science end of things, something has been “described” when a published paper lists all the nitty-gritty details of what it looks like and what features it has, which then gives it a scientific name in two parts: the Genus and the Species. “Ptenothrix” is a genus of these globular springtails, with many different species within the genus. Knowing all of the above, we can now state this project:

1. Investigate all the described species of Ptenothrix here in coastal BC, and confirm that the identifications we’ve been making based on their visual appearance are actually matched up properly with the right species.
2. Investigate all the other undescribed species (those with no scientific name yet, but still belonging to the Ptenothrix genus) and find out how many there are and what they look like.
3. Do some DNA Barcoding and form a family tree of all of these Ptenothrix species to figure out how many there are and how they are related
4. Formally describe the undescribed ones, finally giving them each their own species name.

As we go, we’ll also be building a definitive guide to how to find them and identify each species. Stay tuned for lots of pictures and diagrams!