Observations: Week Four

This week I got to observe my micro-aquarium under a higher powered microscope and was able to take pictures. I saw two Paramecium bursaria floating around between the plants and the top of the water. There were also a lot of Nematodes and a couple of Amoeba sp. There were a few long strands of diatoms, and a lot of very tiny ones, and lastly there was an organism that was moving too fast to take a picture of, or even to identify, but I've included a drawing of what it looked like to me. There was a lot more movement in my micro-aquarium than there has been in past weeks, so there were a lot of pictures to be taken. Here are two pictures of organisms, a picture of the aquarium itself, and my drawing: 

Works Cited:

Patterson DJ. 1992. Free-Living Freshwater Protozoa. New York (NY). p. 51

Observations: Week Three

I got an email from Dr. McFarland saying that Beta food had been added to our micro-aquariums. The food was added on Friday, October 22, 2010. The information about the food is as follows: "Atison's Betta Food" made by Ocean Nutrition, Aqua Pet Americas, 3528 West 500 South, Salt Lake City, UT 84104. Ingredients: Fish meal, wheat flower, soy meal, krill meal, minerals, vitamins and preservatives. Analysis: Crude Protein 36%; Crude fat 4.5%; Crude Fiber 3.5%; Moisture 8% and Ash 15%.

It is so weird that even though it's only the third week of of the project and there's already such a huge difference in my aquarium than there was in the beginning. I saw bunches of paramecium just floating and swinning around and through the aquarium. I was told that I might be able to find some Euplotes, but I couldn't spot any, so I didn't end up having to change the lighting or anything like that. There was another organism that I saw that had flagella attached, but I don't quite know what it was.That's all for this week, again, sorry there were no pictures. But I PROMISE I'll have some up next time.

Observations: Week Two

I returned to my microaquarium this week to observe if there had been any changes or if there were any new organisms to identify. I saw three rotifers. (Sorry, no pictures this week, but there hopefully next time.) The first was darting around at the top of the aquarium, which made it difficult to determine the partiular type, and the other two were hanging around down at the bottom near the soil. I also saw what I think was a type of flagellate. Like I said, hopefully I will have some pictures next week. And apparently food has been added since I last observed the microaquarium, so there should be plenty of changes to discuss.

Setup Day

In lab on Tuesday (October 12) we set up our microaquariums. I used soil and water from source number four (The Holston River), and then (like everyone else) placed some of both 'Plant A' and 'Plant B' and then we observed them under microscopes. So far there hasn't been much to observe so far except that there were very small bugs crawling around on 'Plant A'.

Water source:
(Copied and pasted from http://botany1112010.blogspot.com/)

4. Holston River along John Sevier Hwy under I 40 Bridge

4. Holston River along John Sevier Hwy under I 40 Bridge Partial shade exposure Holston River water Shed N36 00.527 W83 49.549 823 ft 10/10/2010

 
SOURCE: McFarland, Ken. "Botany 111 2010". http://botany1112010.blogspot.com/ 4 October, 2010. Web.