Week Four

For my last observation I noticed that the plants were still in the same state: a few green branches and some visible molds and I needed to add a little water. Under the microscope there I could see the continued increase in diatoms and cyanobacteria and a larger number of epilaxis and euchlanis. I was unable to find any vorticella which had been prevalent last week. I saw a few amoebas, including one that had engulfed a diatom but could not find the protazoa I had seen last week (and photographed but didn't manage to photoshop to include here). I saw two other kinds of horned rotifers but was unable to identify them. I saw and identified a cyclidium (Patterson) and an anisonema (Patterson, Fig 78)*.

I did not have time to identify with a book the above amoeba but chose to include the picture anyway. This was one of several I found in my aquarium last Thursday.




Here we have a cylcidium surrounded by diatoms. Under the microscope I could observe the large central vacuole expand and contract.

In general I observed that the larger organisms I observed at the beginning disappeared and the smaller organisms, particularly the diatoms and cyanobacteria increased. The protozoa did not increase at a great rate but did increase over the weeks I observed.






*Patterson, D. J. Free Living Fresh Water Protozoa. Washington, DC: Manson, 2009.

week three with photos

This week I added a bit of water to my aquarium and noted that there are still some green branches on my dying plants, perhaps indicating that some are getting enough light and nutrients to survive. Under the microscope I noticed a dramatic increase in the number of diatoms (mostly pennularia as identified last week) and an increase in the number of rotifera. For the first time I saw an amoeba and several paramecia (photographed and to be added next week). What appear to be the hyphae of water molds are the webbing I noted last week. I was also able to identify an epilaxis* but it was moving too fast to photograph.














The images above are vorticella sp.* in its free swimming form and attached to part of the plant.













The figure above is the rotifer euchlanis***. There are a lot of these in my micro-aquarium.


* Patterson, DJ. Free Living Freshwater Protozoa. Washinton, DC: Manson, 2009. 141.
** ibid. 113.
***Smith, Douglas Grant. Pennak's Freshwater Invertebrates of the United States. New York: Wiley and Sons, 2001. 143.

If anyone knows how to undo the underline on blogger, please let me know!

week two

This week a food pellet* was added to the micro-aquarium on Friday October 21. When I observed the aquarium on Oct 25 I noticed at high magnification that there were large numbers of bacilli surrounding the pellet as well as long transparent filaments that looked like webbing all around the pellet and the plants. At lower magnification I noticed an increased number of organisms in the aquarium and could see without any magnification that the plants were turning brown and dying.

On Friday Oct 28th I was able to spend more time in the lab and noticed that the bladders on one of the plants were larger and opaque, even though the plant had browned. The sediment was too deep to measure in some spots.

Using Guide to Microlife by Rainis and Russell (Danbury, CT: Franklin Watts, 1996) I was able to identify a diatom in the sediment of the genus navicula. I was also able to identify some filamentous algae, tribomena, using the book Freshwater Algae by Canter-Lund and Lund (Bristol: Biopress LTD, 1995). I was able to photograph several microorganisms but did not have time to identify them.






* "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%.

Week One

This week it appears that the insect who was alive in my microaquarium last week is now dead. I'm still not sure what it is. I thought it might be a water bear but it is much too big for that. It has several microorganisms around it that appear to be feeding on it. One of these organisms seems to be a rotifer and I'll identify it for sure and take a picture next week.

In general there are still not a large number of organisms in the aquarium. I found a few in the sediment (to be identified next week) and a few on the plants. One of the organisms in the sediment seems to be a one celled organism with a flagella and another did not have flagella that I could see and sort of pushed around in the sediment.

In the water I could see some single celled algae or bacteria both in rod and circular shape but no other organisms.

One of the plants, the carnivorous one, has formed some bladders but I did not see any organisms in the bladders.

As of Tuesday 18 October the aquarium had a little over 110 units (I'm unsure what the unit on the microscope is) of sediment at several points.

Getting started

To begin the microaquarium project I selected water from the Holston River along John Sevier Hwy under the I 40 Bridge (see http://botany1112011.blogspot.com/ for more complete information.) As per the instructions I was careful to include a layer of sediment, water from the middle layer and surface water. I included two plants.*

I observed the aquarium first with the naked eye and discovered that my aquarium contained a large insect or arthropod and what seemed to be a worm of some sort. The insect ate some of one of the plants and then dropped to the bottom of the aquarium.

Under the microscope I saw a few microscopic organisms but not many and none were moving very fast. I saw no micro-organisms in the sediment or on the plants themselves.






*Plant A . Amblestegium sp. Moss. Collection from: Natural spring. at Carters Mill Park, Carter Mill Road, Knox Co. TN. Partial shade exposure. N36 01.168 W83 42.832. 10/9/2011



Plant B. Utricularia gibba L. Flowering plant. A carnivous plant. Original material from south shore of Spain Lake (N 35o55 12.35" W088o20' 47.00), Camp Bella Air Rd. East of Sparta Tn. in White Co. and grown in water tanks outside of greenhouse at Hesler Biology Building. The University of Tennessee. Knox Co. Knoxville TN (accessed from http://botany1112011.blogspot.com/

Test post

Checking to see if this works.