week two observations

The video above is of a midge larva. This is a type of insect larva and is the largest organism I have seen in my aquarium. Even on just four times magnification this organism looked large in the microscope. I was able to see through its transparent body and saw what appeared to be other organisms it had swallowed swimming around. This may be evident in the video. This organism was identified with the help of Dr. McFarland.

The video above is of a nematode trying to free itself from a piece of debris without much luck. I watched this for several minutes and I think the nematode either gave up or died trying to escape. This was identified with the help of Dr. McFarland.

The video above may be the most unusual organism I have seen yet. The organism is known as a Lacrymoia and has a long sweeping tentacle with a sucking end that it uses to feed. This stretching tentacle-like part of its body can stretch many times its body length to capture food. I watched this for several minutes and noticed how agile and quick the tentacle was. The main part of the organism never fully showed itself and remained hidden behind the plant stalk for the most part. The source for this was:

Patterson, D.J. Free-Living Freshwater Protozoa: A Colour Guide. Washington D.C. ASM Press. 2003. Figures 300 and 301.

Additional Sightings:

Overall, this week it seemed as though the number of moving life forms increased in my aquarium from week one to two. I predict this may be because a food pellet and more distilled water were added at the end of my observations in week one. This same procedure was done again after my week two observations.

I put the microscope on 100 times magnification and saw thousands of tiny beetle like organisms that looked like a black swarm in one section of clear water. I moved the microscope view of the aquarium to the area right above the muck and observed almost every creature I described here. I next saw several Rotifera with their spinning cilia pulling water into themselves. They are very entertaining to watch in my opinion. I also viewed a Licane rotifer which is oval shaped and has a long tail-like appendage. I saw several desmid algae floating around. I observed many sea urchin-looking stationary organisms that are commonly called star-shaped amoeba. Zooming in on them with the microscope revealed a brilliant color pattern inside their main body. Inside the plants, I observed several sea shrimp darting around and feeding on the plants. The last thing I saw of interest were hundreds of tiny green(even on 40 times magnification) paramecium trapped inside of a Eutricularia. These paramecium were slowly dieing and being digested. All of my information in this paragraph was relayed to me by Dr. McFarland. I viewed almost all of these organisms on 40 times magnification.

Week One Finds

The picture above is the most interesting organism I saw for this viewing session. They had moving cilia that appeared to be rotating around their central body. They never stopped moving during the five minutes I watched them. The movement of their cilia created a propeler like effect and any objects that came near them were propelled through the water at a fast rate away from the two organisms if they got close enough. I identified them as vorticella with the help of Dr. McFarland. There is a video of them posted below.



The organism above and below in the photos was not positively identified. It appeared to contract and expand its body to propel itself through the water. It also appeared to be able to latch onto pieces of muck and water plant with one side of its body.



The organism below is a diatom known as a Lihonotas that I looked up in the following book:
Rainis, Kenneth G., Bruce J. Russell, and Franklin Watts. Guide to Microlife. Figure 285. Danbury, CT. Grolier. 1996. The organism's most interesting feature was the way it moved it appeared to use its two clear ends to propel itself in a jerking fashion through the water.






The organism below is known as a Desmid. I saw several of them located near the bottom of my aquarium. According to Dr. McFarland the area inbetween the two dark green portions of the algae is where the nucleus is located. the source I identified this algae in was:
Forest, Herman Silva. Handbook of Algae. Knoxville, TN. University of Tennessee Press. 1954.







The video video below demonstrates the interesting movement of the two vorticella.

The video below is of an organism known as a ostracod that appears to be feeding on the plantit is attached to. There are many moving parts in this organism that are visible.

Additional Sightings:

Throughout my entire aquarium I observed many transparent beetle like organisms that could move very quickly. I saw them in a variety of places as well. I saw them on the plants, in open water, and in the muck on the bottom. The next organism I saw was a transparent beetle that appeared to have a bubble around it. There were a few of these swimming around in the open water. The next organism looked almost exactly like a lady bug Dr. McFarland identified it as a Rotifer. I then saw a Lecane and a Halteria that were in the bottom of the aquarium. I also saw many ciliates as identified by Dr. Mcfarland and a lot of blue-green algae. Probably the second most interesting creature I saw was a large anelid in the muck that was fairly hard to see. The parts of it I did see looked like a transparent snake. I did not take a picture of it because I did not see all of it at once. That is all of the fascinating organisms I saw in week one.
Additional Source:

Patterson, D.J. Free Living Freshwater Protozoa: A Color Guide. Figure 305. Washington. ASM Press. 2003.

Post 1

Materials and Methods



A microaquarium was obtained with a stand and lid. It was coded with lab period information, table information, and seat position information using three color coded stickers and by wrinting individual initials on each sticker. A pipet was used to extract a small amount of muck from test container nine (individual's choice) and carefully squirted straight down into the microaquarium. Mostly water was then extracted from the same test container using a pipet and filling the microaquarium to about halfway. A square inch of two water plant species was then obtained and placed in opposite sides of the microaquarium. More water from the sample container was then retrieved and placed in the microaquarium up to about two millimeters from the top. A microscope was then used on ten times magnification to observe the contents of the microaquarium. This will be repeated once a week for five weeks. The microaquarium was then lided and put into storage.

Citation

Cook, Rebecca and Kenneth McFarland. General Botany 111 Laboratory Manual. 11th Edition. 1995.

Observations Week One

I first saw a tiny transparent. segmented worm that did not appear to move very much on a part of plant A. After scrolling across the microaquarium I came across a dark hairy oval within plant B, after looking a while in plant B I found many more of these objects. In the muck, Plant A, and plant B I found seven unicellular dark green algae organisms that appeared to move. The most fascinating find on the initial day was a extremely large, transparent yellow tinted worm that was very quick moving and agile. It appeared to be agitated by the light of the microscope and it also seemed extremely hungry, taking several bites of the muck within in a second for at least two minutes. After this amazing find I struggled to find anyting else other than a tail of a transperant blue tinted organism sticking out of the muck. This was all I saw of interest. Good Day.