Notes on the taxonomy of Stentor Oken (Protozoa, Ciliophora) and a description of a new species

The taxonomy of a heterotrichous ciliate genus Stentor has been investigated on the basis of the author's old notebooks and photographs of the species found in and around Hiroshima City, Japan. In addition to the ten known species that were found, including the ones synonymized by Foissner and Wölfl (Foissner and Wölfl, 1994), a new species was also present and is described in this article. The results of grafting an organism of one species with another from either the same or a different species are also given. Use of stock-cultured, live specimens is recommended to observe the characters overlooked or disregarded by Foissner and Wölfl (Foissner and Wölfl, 1994) and to perform the grafting experiment which gives subsidiary information on the taxonomic status of the strains concerned.