Week 5 Observations

So for the final observation, I did find a new organism in my microaquarium

This is a Limnais sp. rotifer (Rainis and Russell 1996). When the microaquarium was disrupted, the organism retreated into itself, but eventually came out as shown in the video above. It's pretty cool to watch.

Other than this, everything looked the same in my microaquarium, there was again just more of each organism present. It's starting to get a little crowded in there actually. I also saw my worm moving around in the dirt at the bottom, but wasn't able to see a clear or good view of it.

Week 4 Observations

It's the last of my observations and there has been a big change. I found a worm! I had seen movement near the bottom of my microaquarium before, but this time I could finally see what was causing the movement, and I'm pretty sure there was more than one because no matter how hard I tried to avoid the nasty things, it kept showing up in my view. One of the distinct feature was small hair like pieces coming off all over the body in pairs. They looked like hairs growing out of warts. I though I wanted to see a big worm, but it was really gross to me. I believe it's a Aeolosoma sp.

The following picture is was I believe some cell division going on and I thought it was cool that there were four. I wasn't able to identify specifically what they were but it's a good picture.

Most of my aquarium looked the same otherwise, just bigger organisms moving about now. 

Week 3 Observations

This week Dr. McFarland added "Atison's Betta Food" made by Ocean Nutrition, Aqua Pet Americas, 3528 West 500 South, Salt Lake City, UT 84104. Ingredients include fish meal, wheat flower, soy meal, krill meal, minerals, vitamins and preservatives. The analysis: Crude Protein 36%; Crude fat 4.5%; Crude Fiber 3.5%; Moisture 8% and Ash 15% (McFarland 2013). This created much more diversity in my microaquarium and much more microorganisms to view. 

One of the first organisms I found was a Bodo sp. It has two flagella and is recognized by it's flickering motion (Patterson 50). 

The next organism I identified was an Epilaxis sp. This had many cilia in on one end, and then one on the opposite end. 

Another ciliate I found was a Tachysoma sp. (Patterson 125). This also had cilia on opposite ends of the organism.

And to add to that was a Pleuronema (Patterson 150) which had a veil on it as shown in the picture below. 

My final picture is a Heterophrys sp. (Patterson 173). This had distinct rigid spikes that were asymmetrical.

I have not found any larger animals like worms or cyclops--mostly just single celled organisms taking over my microaquarium.

Week 2 Observations

In this second week of observations, I saw a lot more in my microaquarium than the first week. There was a lot more movement inside, and a significant increase in organisms living inside. One of the first things I noticed was an amoeba called Chaos sp. The video below shows the movement of the amoeba as it branches out. The black dots inside are debris from the environment and their movement shows the movement of the cytoplasmic movement in the cell along the microtubules. 

Another organism I was able to capture a picture of is the following, an Actinosphaerium sp. This one appears to bringing in an organism to eat. They do this by pulling in the organism with their extensions and slowly pull them inside to digest (Patterson 169). 

 The second picture shown below is of Gloeotrichia sp. algae. It starts growing off on of the plants in the environment, and will grow into a ball on its own (Prescott 928).

 This last picture, shown below, is a Paramecium sp. This is a unicellular protozoa commonly found in ponds and marine life, especially stagnant water (Patterson 343-359).

Other organisms that I found, but were not able to capture on the camera include various rodifers, a Litonotus sp. (Patterson 133), pond scum, and a Stentor sp. ciliate. Stentor sp.'s are sensitive, so when the environment is shaken, it will fold up, and slowly come back out. It looks like a funnel when it unfolds. I'm excited to see how everything grows and develops.

Bibliography

McFarland, Kenneth [Internet] Botany 111 Fall 2013. [cited 10/23/2013]. Available from http://botany1112013.blogspot.com/

Cook, Rebecca and Kenneth McFarland. 2013. General Botany 111 Laboratory Manual. 15th edition. University of Tennessee.

Patterson, DJ. Free-Living Freshwater Protozoa: A Colour Guide. Manson Publishing: Washington DC. 1996.

Prescott, GW. Algae of the Western Great Lakes Area. WMC Brown Company Publishers: Iowa. 1962.

Rainis, Kenneth G and Bruce J Russell. 1996. Guide to Microlife. Franklin Watts: Danbury, Connecticut.

Week 1 observations

For this first week I set up my microaquarium and made initial observations of the environment.

To set up the microaquarium, I used a pipet to first extract mud from the bottom of my sample environment and form a base of my microaquarium. Next, I transferred water from the top and middle of the container via pipet to fill the tank 3/4s of the way. Finally, I added in plant life so that my microaquarium can thrive. These plants included:
Utricularia gibba which is a carnivous, flowering plant. Originally from Spain, this was taken from a greenhouse at the University of Tennessee. It is light green, stringy, and held many black spored throughout the mass of plant.
Amblestegium varium (Hedwig) Lindberg is a moss that was taken from a natural spring at Caters Mill Park  in Tennessee. This moss had long stems with small, hairlike leaves coming off and was dark and light green.
Fontinalis sp. which is another moss but from the Holston River. This appeared much like the previous moss, but much darker in color and almost black in sections of the plant.
All of these plants were collected on 10/13/2013 and added to the microaquarium on 10/16/2013 (McFarland 2013).

The environment my microaquarium was taken from container #9-Pond at Sterchi Hills Greenway Trail found in Knoxville, TN, also extracted from the environment on 10/13/2013 (McFarland 2013).

Upon initial viewing of the microaquarium, few microorganisms were visible. There were small dots that would move around, but nothing at a stage that could be identified. As the food is added and the organisms have time to adjust to the new environment, I'm sure much more life will start to appear