Monday, November 17, 2008



Note: water was added equal to the amount as before.

When viewing the aquarium this week I notced a significant change from last week. Last time there was almost no movement in plant A. This week was exactly opposite. There were lots of organisms feeding in plant A and in plant B life was scarce.
The organisms observed this week included a worm-like organism with two thick flagella attached to its rear. These were numerous around plant A. Upon his viewing of the organism Dr. McFarland stated that this was probably a species of rotifer.
Also seen were oval creatures who were frantically swimming around
plant A as well. There were also multple organisms like this one.
The third and final creature viewed was also speculated to be a rotifer species. However, unlike
the other rotifer species seen this being was attached to a stem of plant A while feeding. It had many tiny hair thin cillia spining in a circular motion. It was unclear whether this was adifferent species than before or if it was simply feeding and therefore was observed as different than the first rotifer.

Monday, November 3, 2008

*water was added prior to these observations equal to one third the total volume of the aquarium.

I first observed the area outside of the plant matter and mud in the bottom. So basically the empty space between the plants and mud. The first organism i saw was an oval shaped transparent multicellular creature. It was propelled by a large single flagella. It randomly swam around taking small bites of things. Many of these were observed. I have not identified this creature yet.
The second organism observed was a bean shaped shelled organism. This one was frantically eating the all of the green parts of plant b. This creature could be either a cypria or cypridopsis (Rainis & Russel). There were many of these organisms present.
A third organism was observed that was very similar to the second except for this one was considerably more transparent than the other. Both seemed to be shelled. This creature was found feeding in plant b as well as in the bottom in the mud.
Last thing observed was that there was no visable movement around plant a.