| BGprojectz |
|
 
0 Comments
Today I found a Rotifer that was feeding on Haematococcus. He stayed for a long time in the same place so it was easy to make a little movie. He was pretty greedy. While i was observing it, at least 10 were eaten! Also a number of misses that ended up besides his mouth.
Diatoms can be found where there is water, also sea water! There are many different species, below you can find a selection of diatoms I found in a sample of North Sea water. Haematococcus Pluvialis is a single cell spherical algae. It is a well known species for its high content of the very strong antioxidant astaxanthin. This antioxidant has anti-inflammatory and immune enhancing effects, goes against dyspepsia, promotes endurance and muscle recovery and helps prevent eyestrain. (If interested, there is a lot of extra info on the internet) It is also used as a pigment, for example, to give farmed salmon a red color. They occur in 3 forms: There is an active form where the green photosynthetic chloroplast is at a distance from the cell wall. This form has 2 flagellae used for swimming. The next stage starts when conditions become less favorable (bright light, high salinity, and low availability of nutrients). The cell builds up large amounts of the red carotenoid pigment astaxanthin and it becomes sedentary. The algae forms a cyst. In the last stage the entire cell becomes filled with astaxanthin. When conditions become more favorable the two flagellae reappear, the astaxanthin disappears and the cell becomes a mobile green alga again. Picture below: Haematococcus Pluvialis in it's first stage, you can clearly see the 2 flagellae. (The camera made it a bit more reddish than it actually was)  Picture below: going to the 2th stage. Building up more red pigment, and the flagellae are just gone.  Picture below: The 2th stage, it forms a cyst, and builds up more red pigment and there are no flagellae  Picture below: This one is in the last stage. The entire cell is filled with astaxanthin.  Last weekend I took a water sample from a large pond. I could only reach the surface water. But there was a lot of life in the sample, a mass of small white creatures swimming around. Under the microscope, i quickly found a Daphnia pulex, what a great little animal! Daphnia pulex is the most common species of water flea. Magnification used: 40x  I also found some other fleas (Ceriodaphnia sp.), you can see them in the pictures below.   Besides the already known, also a lot of new and unknown organisms to me. I can't name them yet. All help and suggestions are welcome. Below also some video of the organisms on the 1st and 4th photo. Besides the diatoms, I also found some bdelloid rotifers. Just like last time they were very fast and active. Not easy to take good photo's. On the photo's and video below you can see some of the rotifers that moved by crawling. There was also another green one, that was free swimming, but he was too fast for me to take pictures.    For this test I took some wet moss from a potted plant in the garden, squeezed the water out, and collected it. Then i prepared several slides with a drop of this water to examine under the microscope. In this first part you can see some of the several Diatoms that I saw. Diatoms are a major group of algae. A unique feature of diatom cells is that they are enclosed within a cell wall made of silica. Also found several empty silica skeletons, but i have no photo's of them. And another one. Can't get enough of these organisms. They are very peaceful and it's relaxing to observe them.  This one was difficult to follow through the microscope, it's a fast organism! But i was lucky when it stopped between some debris for a moment. I immediately started recording. Bdelloidea is a subclass of rotifers. Spread over the world, there are more than 300 species. They can move by swimming or crawling move. Crawling works by taking steps with the head and tail, the same as some leeches do. This gives the group their name (Greek βδελλα or bdella, meaning leech). Found another one today. It was moving slowly from the left to the right.  Today my new compound microscope arrived. Did some quick tests after unpacking. Installed the camera from my stereomicroscop on this one, and got some water from a little garden puddle. This desmid was one my very first discovery's. on this microscope slide. The little picture on the left is with objective 10x, the one below with 40x. and some photo editing. Also added a little video because there was quite a bit of movement inside. (best viewed in full screen) Fascinating organisms!! 
   First attempt to take a picture with my stereo microscope. The "model", a mosquito larva, was caught in the garden. This picture is a side view. Mosquitoes go through four stages in their lifecycles: egg, larvae, pupa and imago (adult). As larvae they live under water, mostly at the surface eating algae and small organisms. They breathe through a breathing tube called a siphon. (top left in picture) When disturbed, they dive below the surface by jerky movements of their entire bodies, giving them the common name of "wigglers" or "wrigglers".  |
RSS Feed