Blog 2- Week 2

Well here we are onto week two.

Last week I mentioned that I thought I had euglanoids but as I was talking to Dr. McFarland and realized that the little creatures that would crawl along on the plant were actually rotifers. More commonly known as Philodina. They also seem to have increased in size and numbers, they are all over my tank.

This week, the food source was added to our tank according to our class blog it consists of : On Thursday October 4, 2008 one pellet of "Atison's Betta Food" was added to each Micro Aquaria. It is 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%.

I was really surprised by the difference! All of the microorganism seemed to swarm around this and little pieces that had been broken off. In particular there were these globs of tiny little guys, definitely juveniles of some kind. They had very jerk motions and were just swarming around the food. We will have to wait and see what they turn into. Our guess is that they might be Juvenile cillates or cladophora.

I also noticed something new...Cilliates. They were everywhere, I had seen them before but wasn't sure what they were till I was told. They are definitely increasing in number sort of like the ones that might be swarming around the food.

I also saw plant bladders that had broken off from the plant turned brown and died.

For the first time I got to use the microscope camera which was super cool! I am not sure when I will get my pictures that I took but I will added them as soon as I do. I discovered while using it these tiny little black and white worms. I will have to wait and see what they are when they get bigger, but some stayed in place and spun their tales around really fast and other moved in this S shaped pattern. I think they could be mosquito larva but we shall see. There seem like 50 or more of these little guys!

Next week I will be looking through trying to discover what all of these creatures are and then hopefully posting pictures to go along.

Another one was a round organisms that had little shoots coming out all over. It would suck them in and then spit them back out to move. We think it is an actinpshaerium of some kind. Though Dr. McFarland hadn't seen them move before but this guy definitely did.

Next there were Nematodes all over the place. Just swimming as fast as they could. They are very much like worms.

Finally, I noticed that my bright green plant, the carnivorous one seems to have spread out as if it is trying to catch more of the organisms. You can distinctly still see the bladders all through the plant.

Well, that is all for now, i am sure there will be more to come next week!