- Nearly 200 species of Phormidium are
found worldwide, forming mats on wet soils and rocks, mud, macrophytes,
and in both standing and running waters. Certain species inhabit
the more extreme environments of thermal springs, desert soils,
and subarctic waters. Some are found along the shoreline of the
frozen lakes and melt streams of the Antarctic's Victoria Land,
while others dominate the cryptogamic crusts that help to
- enrich and stabilize desert soils.
-
- Phormidium corallyticum dominates the pathogenic microbial associations that
destroy coral reefs. Phormidium and the other microbes
produce hydrogen sulfide the leads to anoxic conditions that
kill the corals and allow the nutrients from their tissues to
be harvested. This "black band disease" slowly moves
across the coral a few millimeters a day until the reef is systematically
degraded to a lifeless skeleton.
-
- Phormidium fragile
inhabits the grounds adjacent to the active volcano Mount Erebus
on Ross Island, Antartica, where temperatures reach 60°C.
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