A mutant hydra strain L4 produces buds at a much lower rate than the standard wild-type strain (105) when fed with brine shrimp nauplii (T. Sugiyama and T. Fujisawa, 1979b, Dev. Growth Differ. 21, 361-375). It was found that addition of a small amount of tubifex worm tissue to the normal brine shrimp diet significantly improved the budding rate of L4 but not of 105. Detailed examination and comparison of food effect on various developmental processes in L4 and 105 have provided the following observations. (1) L4 development is strongly affected by food and has significantly lower rates than 105 in all the developmental parameters examined which involve the bud initiation process. In contrast, such effects and differences are not observed in parameters not involving bud initiation. These observations suggest that L4 has a defect(s) in its bud initiating mechanisms and that the expression of this defect is somehow strongly affected by food. (2) Epithelial cells proliferate in L4 nearly as rapidly as in 105 and without food effect. Epithelial cells produced by cell division are mostly utilized to form buds in mature 105 polyps. These cells, however, are not fully utilized for this purpose in L4 polyps which bud very slowly. Instead, they appear to be somehow lost from tissue in these animals.