Observation session 3

On Thursday, October 27 I went for another observation session in the lab. This week, Dr. McFarland fed the aquariums two beta fish food pellets, and it really sped up the micro-organisms multiplication. The information on the food pellet is as follows:"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%. When I put the aquarium under the microscope I could not believe how many more organisms there were. This week I was able to really get down to identifying organisms and was able to capture pictures of most of what I saw. First off, I saw many of the same rotifers that I saw last week and figured out that their name is Euchlanis(Smith fig.7.2) . Also I saw and confirmed my finding of Vorticella (Patterson im. 232) with in the small ecosystem. Then I got into finding new organisms by first identifying an Artocrea (Hayden plate XXX) while under the normal microscope. Unfortunately, I was not able to capture a picture of this, but it was a circular, yellowish organism with dots in the interior of the body. Then a camera linking microscope opened up and I was able to go in and find the first two organisms I mentioned. This was easy because they had multiplied to such high numbers. As I looked around under the camera, I was able to find an Epalxis (Patterson im. 311) which I also observed the week earlier. It was more difficult to take a picture of because it is a fast moving, small organism with many little flagella out of the back and a foot on the front. I then found another brand new organism called a Raphodocystis (Patterson im. 408). It is a circular organisms with spike like radiations coming out from all sides. Down at a lower level there were extremely small organisms moving very fast, but would be nearly impossible to identify at this time and under this level of magnification. Over all it was impressive how many more organisms there were from one week to the other. It went from really having to search for organisms, to not being able to look under the microscope without seeing any. Above are the pictures of the organisms I have found so far.