Contributions to the Freshwater Microfauna of Tasmania

The foHowing communications owe their creation to the friendly courtesy of Dr. A. G. Nicholls, who let me have the freshwater material, collected during a lengthy stay in Tasmania, for the zoogeographical evaluation. Here, too, Dr. A. Komzak should be thanked most cordially for the translation into English. Since the evaluation of the various animal groups necessarily takes a rather long time and also the distance of the place of publishing from Europe entails considerable delays, I prefer not to wait for the completion of the whole work before the printing is begun. Instead, I propose to submit the results in three consecutive sections of which this, the first, comprises the Copepoda. The second is to deal with the remaining Entomostraca, the third with the Amphipoda as well as further animal groups and the zoogeographical results. As some samples were abundant in Diatomeae, a further communication on these is planned by Dr. Hustedt. I wish to thank Dr. M. Beier from the Vienna Imperial Museum for the procurement of several papers. Although the zoogeographical discussion of the found species is reserved for the final section, it may be stressed already here that the species described as nov. spec., and also those compiled by Smith, cannot be considered to be Tasmanian endemisms. They will certainly be found in adjacent parts of the Australian Continent.