Week 1 Observation

I observed my MicroAquarium through a microscope on Wednesday, October 20.  I saw quite a few seed shrimp (pictured above) swimming around the areas near the plants (identified from Rains and Russell 1996).  This is the organism I described last time as looking like a clam with hairs coming out of the space between the two parts of the shell.


I was able to photograph an organism that may be a trachyosoma (pictured below).  Since I didn't get a very clear picture, I wasn't able to positively identify it.

I also observed the "contact lens-like" organisms I mentioned in my last post, but I was unable to locate them long enough to take a picture of them.


In general, I noticed that the areas of the water around the plants and soil were full of life, but the clear water didn't appear to have any living organisms.  It was very interesting to look through the microscope and see the organisms moving around in the water, but extremely difficult to take pictures of them, since they move very quickly and tend to spend most of their time moving among the plants.  Interestingly, I did not see any of the "tick-like" organisms that I spotted when I first set up my MicroAquarium.


Citations:
Rains Kenneth G, Russell Bruce J.  1996.  Guide to Microlife.  Franklin Watts.  p. 204, 209.