Checklist of tardigrades in Germany as a contribution to biodiversity research

Abstract Over 250 years ago Johann August Ephraim Goeze, a Protestant pastor from Quedlinburg, Germany, discovered the first tardigrade. The German physiologist and anatomist Carl August Sigismund Schultze (1795–1877) later named the first species Macrobiotus hufelandi C.A.S. Schultze, 1834, a designation that remains valid today. By the first third of the twentieth century numerous new species had been discovered in Germany and were comprehensively compiled for the first time by the German zoologist Ernst Marcus in 1936. Since then additional faunistic studies have been conducted. This new checklist of tardigrades in Germany provides an overview of all known species found in the country to date. It includes 91 limno-terrestrial or limnic species and eight marine species, with 21 belonging to Heterotardigrada and 78 to Eutardigrada. Germany is the type locality (terra typica) for 24 tardigrade species. The number of identified tardigrade species varies significantly depending on the extent of studies conducted in different federal states. Baden-Württemberg has the highest number of species identified, with 80 species recorded across eleven studies. In this state the Black Forest, with its remarkable diversity of 72 identified tardigrade species is one of the most intensively studied regions worldwide. In Hesse 30 species have been recorded from five studies, while Berlin has documented 23 species from two studies. Fewer species have been reported from other federal states. The 99 tardigrade species identified in Germany represent about 7% of the total 1,488 described tardigrade species worldwide.