week 5

My last week of observation in the MicroAquarium was fairly calm. As I said in my last post, many of the smaller organisms have been eaten by the bigger, more complex organisms. One of the multicellular organisms I saw this week was a Nematode (Pennak 1989). The Nematode was eating at the very top of the dirt line.

There were also still multiple Vorticella on the dirt line (Patterson 1982). The Vorticella are multicellular and not mobile.

Also in the dirt line were multiple unidentified diatoms. There were a few smaller organisms though. Multiple Bodos could be found swimming around (Patterson 1982) . They swam smoothly around the middle part of the aquarium with two small tails. A few rotifers were also swimming around the middle and top part of the tank, but it was a significantly less number than could be seen at the first observations. Overall, the first week was very uneventful, but the following weeks came with more action up until the 4th week. Last week and this week were much less eventful because many of the organisms have died. Some of the dead organisms can be seen littered at top of the dirt line. 

week 4

My MicroAquarium was significantly less busy this week. The food pellet was entirely gone, along with most of the action that accompanied it. There was an unidentified, worm-like analyd moving around at the top of the tank along with multiple cyclops, but those were really the only mobile organisms present in the aquarium. Both are fairly large, multicellular organisms, so I would assume that they ate the smaller organisms once the food pellet ran out. This explains the lack of activity as well as the dead organisms littering the bottom of the tank. The Amblestegium varium moss and Utricularia gibb were both still present in the tank to provide oxygen (McFarland 2013). There were also still some Vorticella still attached to the moss(Patterson 1982).

Bibliography

Works Cited

Penn

Pennak, RW. 1989. Fresh-water invertebrates of the United States. 3rd ed. New York (NY): 
               John Wiley and Sons Inc. 628 p.

PAT   Patterson DJ. 1982. Free-living invertebrates protozoa. Washington DC: ASM Press. 223p.

McFarland, Kenneth [Internet] Botany 111 Fall 2013. [11 November 2013]. Available from  mmmmmhttp://botany1112013.blogspot.com/

week 3

This week my MicroAquarium was much more eventful due to the food pellet that was added towards the top of the aquarium. There was activity outside of the food pellet though. There were 2 Vorticella attached to the moss at the top of the aquarium (Patterson 1982). They are multicellular organisms that are stationary and kind of bell shaped.  Also attached to the moss at the top of the tank were a few rotifer called Limnias (Patterson 1982).They were stationary, but the were eating the moss through what looked like a tube. 

The food pellet though, was where most of the action could be found. There was a huge number of Philodina eating the pellet (Pennak 1989). They are all multicellualr organisms that move around kind of like an inchworm. 

There were also multiple Euchlanis swimming around near the crumbs that came off of the food pellet (Pennak 1989). They are multicellular and have a tail that allows them to swim smoothly through the water.

Also found swimming around using their cilia were multiple Tachysomes (Patterson 1982). They're long, multicellular organisms that were found towards the top of the tank.

There were still no dead organisms at the bottom of the tank this week.

Week 2

This week was much more active in my MicroAquarium. Last week there weren't any life forms I could find, just the chlorophyll plants that were placed to provide oxygen. This week though, I saw a variety of life forms, all multi cellular. I could find 3 different cyclops in my aquarium, all in different life stages. They seemed to hang around the middle part of the aquarium, closer to the dirt and moved in sudden, jerky movements. I also observed 3 rotifers swimming around smoothly with little tails right above the dirt line. Also right above the dirt line was a type of crustacean called a copepod. The copepod swam smoothly through the water with frequent pauses. A little further down, settled into the dirt line a diatom could be observed. Its a seemingly stationary organism, but it does, in fact, move quite frequently. I couldn't see any dead organisms at the bottom of the tank this week, but it was definitely more lively. There number of organisms greatly increased, and the Amblestegium varium moss and Utricularia gibb were both still present. This week, there was also a beta food pellet added to each aquarium on Friday, October 25 of 2013. "Atison's Betta Food" was made by Ocean Nutrition, Aqua Pet Americas, at 3528 West 500 South, Salt Lake City, UT 84104. The ingredients include: Fish meal, wheat flower, soy meal, krill meal, minerals, vitamins and preservatives. The analysis includes: Crude Protein 36%; Crude fat 4.5%; Crude Fiber 3.5%; Moisture 8% and Ash 15% (McFarland, 2013).

Setting Up My MicroAquarium

 To set up our MicroAquarium we received a a glass tank, a stand holder, and a lid. We then coded our aquariums with color dots so that we could find them each time we came back to the lab. Mine was coded with two green dots and a blue dot, signifying the lab section, the table I sat at, and My seat number, respectively. I then wrote my initials on the dots just for extra assurance. My water came from the Tennessee river at a boat camp across from the Knoxville sewage plant. With a pipet, I extracted enough mud and water from the bottom of the water sample to fill about 1/3 of my MicroAquarium, then another 1/3 from the middle, and the last 1/3 from the top of the water sample. After my water sample was complete, I placed a small bit of Amblestegium varium moss and Utricularia gibb in the aquarium so that there would be an oxygen supply for any potential organisms in the sample. Right after set up, I put my MicroAquarium under a microscope to look for any organisms. This first week I could not find any stationary or moving organisms, but both the Amblestegium varium moss and the Utricularia gibb are chlorophyll green organisms. After observing my MicroAquarium, I placed it on its stand, put on the lid, and placed it in my lab section's container.