Week of November 3-7

The cleanest MicroAquarium this side of the Mississippi. . .

The reason for the title is due to the snails in the tank. I now have around 15-20 snails each of which is named Dwight (from now on, I will call them "Dwights"). The Dwights constantly slide around the glass and clean the algae and dirt. Also, because of this, there are no amoebas in my MicroAquarium. I was hoping to see some, but I like having an army of Dwights better. On the bottom, I found one dead Dwight. He could have been killed by the planarian when they fought last week (as mentioned in my last blog). . . or it could have just been his time to go.

I've found another planarian (possibly the same one that killed Dwight). I'm able to guess that it is

a planarian because of the indentations on the forehead. However, this murdering planarian could also be a Mesostoma Macroprostatum (1). The fact of the matter is that it doesn't matter if he is a planarian or an M&M, he should be locked up for killing Dwight. This is the killer's mug-shot.

A young fellow named Frank has just moved into the neighborhood. It is some type of midge (possibly a Phantom Midge), but I know that he is a Phylum Arthropoda insect larvae. You can see the peristaltic movements within the midge. Its pictures are showing both its anterior and posterior.

Plant #2 (the algae/grass looking plant) has GREATLY grown. It now covers about half of the tank. This is where most of the organisms reside because the Dwights have a harder time sliding around in the plants. There are a few Euplotes (protozoa with cilia in the Phylum Ciliophora) that are stuck to the plant. Within this plant area, I found two ciliates. One of them (pictured on the left) is an unknown. It is distinctive by the "bubble" on the posterior, but I could not find in any of the books an organism that resembled it. The other ciliate found had a hooded-tail. It moved very quickly, so I wasn't able to get a picture. From what I saw, however, it could be either a loxode or a loxophylum (2). The loxophylum has warts on one side, but I was not able to observe the ciliate long enough to see if it had those warts. I was not able to find it again, but hopefully it will show up again so I can decide on which one it might be.

Also, in Plant #2, I found a few tabellaria of diatoms (3). A tabellaria is a genus of diatoms. They are cuboid in shape and are attached at the corners so that t he colonies give somewhat of a zigzag shape. I'm thinking that the actually diatoms themselves are melosira, but I'm not positive on that one. One of the clusters is pictured to the right.

The other life in the slide is abundant, as always, and continues to grow.

(1) Pennak's Freshwater Invertebrates of the United States by Douglas Grant Smith

(2) Free-Living Freshwater Protozoa by D.J. Patterson

(3) Freshwater Algae by Hilda Canter-Lund and John W.G. Lund [figure 230]

Week of October 27-31

An army of snails have invaded the MicroAquarium!

There are numerous amounts of snails in the slide, around ten or so to be exact.  It is very interesting to see them crawling on the glass sides.  You can see the snails' mouths eating algae as they skim along the glass (a video of this will be posted once the lab is able to do so).  It's pretty neat to watch.  Also, their shells are transparent, and I am able to see their innards.  The coolest part about their clear shells is the fact that I can see their hearts beating.  In the bottom, dirt area, I was able to witness a large nematode and a snail fighting.  Unfortunately, my hands weren't quick enough to take a picture, but it was an epic battle of microscopic wits.

Here are two images of some snails that I found:

This is one of the many snails that I found.

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I attempted to capture a picture of multiple snails in one photo. . . these are the results---------------------------->

Along with these snails, many more organisms have sprung to life in the aquarium.  There are a few VERY large rotifers along with a few large nematodes.  In every square unit of the MicroAquarium, there are hundreds of paramecium, especially around the algae from the river water.  There are a few visible stephanodiscuses, circular diatoms and a few noticeable pinnulara.  But, there is a large community of melosira, rod-shaped diatoms, around the grass pieces.

Along with these other findings, I found a few ostracods, about twenty euplotes, and other variously sized rotifers.  Also, in the dirt at the bottom, I found one planaria, but it wasn't doing much, so I think it might have been dead. . . or taking a nap from all the hard work that the day had to offer.  Its hard being a planaria. . .