Final Observations

     When I went in to observe for the final time on November 12, 2010, the top to my aquarium had accidentally been removed and their had been significant water loss.  I refilled it with water and continued to finish my observations.  The first part I observed was the soil level.  I observed 3 annelids moving through the soil.  After all of the water loss, annelids continued to be prevalent in my micro-aquarium.  I even observed one shooting some food that must have been bad out of its mouth.

This was very neat to witness first hand.  the small orb to the right is what was projected from the flatworm.  

     I also observed seed shrimp for the first time in my aquarium.  I found two and they must have been late bloomers since this was the first time that I have observed them.  Here is a photo:

It has many cilia projecting from its body as shown here in the picture.

     When observing my aquarium by hand, I noticed a small dot that I had to check out.  It turns out it was my snail.  The snail has been very interesting to see mature.  It has been in the aquarium since the beginning and now it is large enough to see with the naked eye:

     I also noticed a cyclops that was more mature than any cyclops I have observed before.  It had clearly defined parts.  I captured a good photo of one.

      This concludes my final observations.  It was very interesting working with the micro-aquariums and seeing how life grows so immensely, even life we can not see with our own eyes.

Observation 3: 29 October 2010

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     I went in for my third observation on Friday, October 29, 2010.  I learned that on Friday, October 22, 2010, one beta food pellet had been added to my micro-aquarium.  The information for the food pellet is posted at the end of this post.  As far as my observations go, I observed three different sections of the aquarium: the soil, plant A on the left, and plant B on the right.  In the soil, I observed many small circular organisms moving around.  There were many of them but I do not think they are significant at this stage in their development.  I also noticed some larger organisms that were using flagella to move around efficiently.  Moving through the soil I noticed an annelid.
     I seem to have many worms living in my aquarium because when I went to observe plant A, there were multiple worms of all different types.  I saw many annelids as well as planarians, which are flatworms.  I took a video of one flatworm (a Stenostomum Leucops) moving around and have linked it below.
                           
I also noticed an Actinosphaerium attempting to digest an organism.  It was very interesting and I wanted to take a video but I was unable to find it again underneath the camera.
     Last time I went in for observations, I saw almost all of the substantial life surrounding plant B, but this week I noticed little to no large life.  I am not sure for the cause of this yet but one idea I have is that the food pellet was inserted on the side nearer plant A.  I did notice, however, the bladder's on Plant B and they were very interesting.  This concludes my observations for October 29, 2010.

Information for food pellet:
"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%.

Observation 2 : October 22, 2010

      On October 22, 2010, at 12:00 PM, I observed my micro-aquarium for the first time since I created it.  The first thing I noticed was a little water loss due to evaporation most likely.  I then put my micro-aquarium and began to observe.   In general, life seemed to have decreased in my micro-aquarium.  I first observed the soil level, where I saw a few creatures that seemed to be moving by the use of flagellum.  There were also thin worm-like creatures in the soil.  I then began to observe around my plants.  Around Plant A, there was very little life.  I observed one small creature moving along a leaf blade.  But when observing Plant B, I found relatively an abundance of life.  The first thing I found was a huge creature that amazed me.  I soon came to find out that it was a snail.  This is a picture of it's head because it was too large to fit in the picture frame:

     Wrapped around the plant were many worms called annelids.  They moved pretty fast and were hard to capture in pictures, but I took two to shoe the body of the annelid.  These are pictures of the body of two different annelids. I hope to get pictures of their heads and tails in future observations.  The annelids have cilia projecting form them to aid in movement

      In what I believe was one of the roots of Plant B, there were hundreds of little green creatures.  There were very interesting.
      Next, I found two cyclops that were swimming around near Plant B.  The cyclops really interested me because I observed the way they were feeding  Here they are:

     This is what I observed when I viewed my micro-aquarium on October 22, 2010.

Day 1: Setting Up

     

Day 1: Set Up and Observations

                                            

      On October 12, 2010, we set up micro-aquariums in order to observe how all different types of living organisms interact within a closed environment.  First, we had to pick a water source from which to observe.  I chose a water source from a pool of water below Lynnhurst Cemetery where a spring was present.  Lynnhurst Cemetery is off of Adair Drive. Knox Co. Knoxville, TN.  There was partial shade exposure and it was a spring fed pond.  Its coordinates were  N36 01.357 W83 55.731 958 feet, and the sample was collected on 10/10/2010.  (Botany 111).  A picture of the sample is located above.

      First, I placed a thin layer of soil from the sample into the bottom of the micro-aquarium, then i added water from the middle of the water sample.  After that, I placed two plants on each side of the aquarium:

Plant A - 

Fontinalis sp. Moss. Collection from: Natural spring. at Carters Mill Park, Carter Mill Road, Knox Co. TN. Partial shade exposure. N36 01.168 W83 42.832. 10/10/2010.  

Plant B - Utricularia gibba L. Flowering plant. A carnivous plant. Original material from south shore of Spain Lake (N 35o55 12.35" W088o20' 47.00), Camp Bella Air Rd. East of Sparta Tn. in White Co. and grown in water tanks outside of greenhouse at Hesler Biology Building. The University of Tennessee. Knox Co. Knoxville TN.  (Botany 111).

      After my micro-aquarium was set up, I observed it under a microscope.  The first thing I noticed were giant worm-like creatures that were wrapped around certain parts of Plant B.  I believe they were Annelids.  I observed many other creatures that were small, round, and very quick.  They would swim across the screen very quickly.  There appeared to be many of these creatures in the aquarium.  These were the two things that I observed on the first day of the experiment.  

Work Cited:

McFarland K. 2010 [cited 2010 Oct 11].Botany 111 2010. [Internet]. Knoxville, TN: Available from:            

     

http://botany1112010.blogspot.com/.