3rd Observation

Last Wednesday, October 30th, I made my 3rd observation of the Microaquarium.  The previous day our instructor had added a small food pellet to our tanks.  I made the prediction that the amount of activity seen in the tank would increase dramatically.  This theory proved to be correct.  There were numerous lifeforms swimming all around the food pellet, and several new organisms that I had not noticed before.  I spent approximately 2.5 hours in the lab studying many different varieties of life.

Among these organisms were many Rotifers.  Euchlanis sp. was the most common form of these (Patterson 2003).  I noticed for the first time that these Rotifers had tails that were forked.  I previously thought that it was a single prehensile-type appendage, but was surprised to see that it was actually two individual structures.  An even more abundant life form in my sample this week was a small organisms that was shaped like a sphere with many "spines" sticking out from the center.  It looked much like a drawing of a sun might look.  After several minutes of debate, and the help of D.J. Patterson's book, it was identified as being an Acathaystis.  We took several detailed pictures of the organism and were able to narrow our options down.  I will add the pictures we took throughout the next week, after they have been properly edited and re-sized.

I also was able to capture pictures of a Lacrymaria (Patterson 2003).  It had the shape of an oval when it was stationary, but when it moved it could elongate its body, and appeared like a small squash might look.  Its mouth parts and large vacuole became clearly visible when it elongated its body making it easier to identify.  Again, I will add pictures in the coming week.  A Bodo was also seen swimming around in the tank this week (Patterson 2003).  It is a very small organism with two flagella, one much longer than the other.  It contained a small vacuole.  I only observed one of these, but I am certain there are more.

There were also several cyanobacteria sen in the Microaquarium this week.  The most common one I noticed was Chroococcus (Patterson 2003).  It took the shape of two green cells joined together with a thick membrane enclosing both of them.  I did not notice any movement from this organism.

After observing these things, I uploaded my images to Photoshop, and began to narrow down which images I will be posting to this blog.  I started with nearly 60 images, and though I have finished the final selection process, I must now go back and re-size and enhance the images for better quality and resolution.  Check back by Thursday for the updated images of these and hopefully other organisms.