Abstract
1. 1. Freshwater oligochaetes can take up considerable amounts of acetate and propionate (short-chain, volatile fatty acids, VFA) from artificial tap water at concentrations of 50–3000 μ M. 2. 2. Four species of oligochaetes which are studied in this paper, Tubifex tubifex, Limnodrilus hoffimeisteri, liodrilus templetoni (Tubificidae) and Lumbriculus variegatus (Lumbriculidae) differ considerably in their mechanisms of VFA uptake as well as in the absolute amounts absorbed. 3. 3. In T. tubifex, acetate and propionate uptake results from a combination of saturable (mediated) and nonsaturable (diffusional) transport. Both, L. hoffineisteri and I. templetoni take up acetate by a mediated transport system, whereas propionate is absorbed passively. In L. variegatus, no evidence for a mediated transport system is found. 4. 4. The relevance of the results to the biochemical ecology of the freshwater oligochaetes is discussed.
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