This alliance includes submerged, free-floating vegetation of bladderworts, Utricularia australis and U. vulgaris, in mesotrophic to naturally eutrophic shallow water bodies. Larger stands are developed only in clear water which does not dry out in summer, or in habitats in which the bottom is exposed only for a short time and complete substrate desiccation does not occur. This vegetation thus occurs mainly in precipitation-rich areas. In the past decades occurrences of this vegetation type in fishponds has declined, but it has become newly established in other types of man-made water bodies such as pools in abandoned sand pits.