• Due to ongoing issues caused by Search, it has been temporarily disabled
  • Please excuse the mess, we're moving the furniture and restructuring the forum categories
  • You may need to edit your signatures.

    When we moved to Xenfora some of the signature options didn't come over. In the old software signatures were limited by a character limit, on Xenfora there are more options and there is a character number and number of lines limit. I've set maximum number of lines to 4 and unlimited characters.

A World of Life in a Drop of Water — My Father's Microscope

Bob Blaylock

Forklift Operator
Joined
Jan 29, 2008
Messages
3,005
Location
N38°35' W121°29'
When my father passed away in December, I inherited, among other things, his microscope. Lately, I've been going out and collecting bits of gutter water, moss, lichen, and such; mixing it together, and then looking at random drops of it through this microscope.

Just last night, I felt inspired to dig out my cheap digital camera, point it into the microscope's eyepiece, and see what kind of pictures I could get. My expectations were very low. I figured that to get decent pictures though a microscope would probably require more specialized equipment than this.

I was rather pleasantly surprised with the results that I got. Though one could wish for better pictures than these, I've been getting results much better than I thought I could get using such crude methods.

All of these pictures were taken with a Kodak DC3200 camera, using the 15X eyepiece and the 10X objective on the microscope. (The microscope has 5X, 10X and 60X objectives, and 5X, 10X, and 15X eyepieces. The 15X eyepiece has a scale built into it, part of which is visible in the last of the attached pictures here.


Of the attached pictures, the first and third are of paramecia (not the same one in each picture). I think the second is a dead tartigrade or “water bear”. It wasn't moving. The last two, I think, are of some sort of rotifers.

All of these images are to the same scale. According to notes in my father's hand, written on the inside of the microscope's case, with the 10X objective, each ten marks (that's the small marks, ten from one number to the next) on the scale in the 15X eyepiece is equal to 122 micrometers. That's about a hundred pixels on each of these images, so each pixel on these images is 1.22 micrometers.

My display has about 100 pixels per inch, so each inch on my display is approximately 122 micrometers in the scale of these images.

1_in
1_mm CONVERT
.122_mm
÷​

So these pictures, as they appear on my screen, are about 208X actual size.
 

Attachments

  • 20090308_1859_DeadWaterBear.jpg
    20090308_1859_DeadWaterBear.jpg
    9.7 KB · Views: 1,389
  • 20090308_0019_Paramecium.jpg
    20090308_0019_Paramecium.jpg
    2.9 KB · Views: 1,416
  • 20090308_1949_Paramecium.jpg
    20090308_1949_Paramecium.jpg
    2.4 KB · Views: 1,368
  • 20090308_2020_Rotifer.jpg
    20090308_2020_Rotifer.jpg
    1.6 KB · Views: 1,386
  • 20090308_2029_Rotifers.jpg
    20090308_2029_Rotifers.jpg
    6 KB · Views: 1,379
Last edited:
All of these pictures were taken with a Kodak DC3200 camera, using the 15X eyepiece and the 10X objective on the microscope. (The microscope has 5X, 10X and 60X objectives, and 5X, 10X, and 15X eyepieces. The 15X eyepiece has a scale built into it, part of which is visible in the last of the attached pictures here.
·
·
·​
All of these images are to the same scale.



I was just looking again at the full (non-cropped) versions of these images, and I have realized that the “dead water bear” picture was not taken with the 15X eyepiece. The 15X eyepiece, as I mentioned, has a scale in it, while the 5X and 10X eyepieces do not. The scale appears in every picture that I have taken and kept, except for the “Dead Water Bear” picture, so I must have taken that one with one of the other eyepieces.

See the attached pictures. The scale appears in the “Rotifers” picture, but not in the “Dead Water Bear” picture.

I should be able to figure out which one I did use, assuming I was still using the 10X objective. When I was observing this, I did, at some point, measure it and determine that it was about the right size to be an adult water bear. As it appears on my screen, it spans about 30 millimeters. A 208X magnification would mean that it was really 0.144 mm, which would be awfully small. If I had used the 5X eyepiece, staying with the 10X objective, then the magnification would be reduced by a factor of three. «208 3 ÷» gives me 69.3333… — call it 70.

«30 70 ÷» 0.42 of a millimeter. Still a bit small. I bet I used the 5X objective as well, so reduce the magnification to 35. «30 35 ÷» gives me 0.85 of a millimeter — a very plausible size for a tardigrade. So that picture was surely taken using the 5X eyepiece and the 5X objective.
 

Attachments

  • 20090308_2029_Rotifers_Full.jpg
    20090308_2029_Rotifers_Full.jpg
    15.2 KB · Views: 32
  • 20090308_1859_DeadWaterBear_Full.jpg
    20090308_1859_DeadWaterBear_Full.jpg
    53.8 KB · Views: 32
Today (well, now it was yesterday) I went to a nearby park to gather samples from a duck pond. Of course, I took more pictures. I seem to be getting better at producing usable pictures this way.


I found a lot of this sort of unicellular algae in the sample. It seemed to be, by far, the most dominant form of life in the water from this pond. The image here was taken using the 60X objective, with the 15X eyepiece. I estimate that each pixel on this image represents 0.2 of a micrometer. The two algae cells shown here are approximately 20 micrometers in diameter.
attachment.php



This cyclops was photographed using the 5X objective and the 10X eyepiece. I estimate each pixel to be 3.45 micrometers, and this Cyclops to have an overall length of about 135 micrometers.
attachment.php



Here's a rather interesting rotifer. I took this using the 10X objective and the 15X eyepiece. This seems to be the combination that I most often use, which produces an image in which each pixel is 1.22 micrometers. This rotifer is about 300 micrometers in length. The round object appears to be attached to the rotifer. I don't know if it's some sort of egg sac, or just some random object that the rotifer grabbed on to and had been towing around ever since.
attachment.php



I am sure that at some point in my distant past, I had a name for this critter. I cannot now come up with any name for it, nor can I find any help on the net. (It's much easier to find out about something if you know what it is called.) It's roughly 130 micrometers in diameter.
attachment.php




This last object, I have no idea what it is. When I first saw one, I though perhaps it had to do with the unicellular green algae in the first picture. It looked like there was a hollow space inside, with some of these algae inside of it. Indeed, the dark circular objects that you see are these green algae, but they are in front of this object, not inside of it. This was photographed using the 10X objective and 15X eyepiece, and it is approximately 170 micrometers in diameter.
attachment.php



 

Attachments

  • 20090314_1916_Algae.jpg
    20090314_1916_Algae.jpg
    37.5 KB · Views: 2,489
  • 20090315_0018.jpg
    20090315_0018.jpg
    40.6 KB · Views: 2,483
  • 20090314_2111_Cyclops.jpg
    20090314_2111_Cyclops.jpg
    36.6 KB · Views: 1,282
  • 20090315_0039_Rotifer.jpg
    20090315_0039_Rotifer.jpg
    43.4 KB · Views: 1,580
  • 20090315_0034.jpg
    20090315_0034.jpg
    37.2 KB · Views: 2,498
Last edited:
I had a microscope when I was a kid, and loved it. Of course, it didn't take long for me to disassemble it completely and put it back together, several times. It always worked after each time, often better than before because the quality control at the manufacturer was pretty bad -- dust inside, smears on the lenses, etc.

Nearly got me fired when I was working as a lab grunt in high school. The boss came back early from lunch and discovered I'd spread his $2000 pride-and-joy workhorse binocular microscope across the bench in pieces and was happily cleaning the interior optical surfaces. I was like, what? I've done this before. I sent him out for a smoke, put everything back together by the time he'd returned, and even he had to admit you could "see" better through it than before. I didn't tell him that the most likely culprit was tobacco smoke (that stuff gets everywhere, even inside hermetically-sealed units) condensed on the lenses. The guy smoked like a chimney, especially when writing.

I've been looking at the 'scopes at American Science and Surplus. Some of the Russian models are extremely tempting, price-and-quality-wise.

Beanbag
 
These three pictures were all taken using the 60X objective, and the 15X eyepiece. Each pixel is approximately 0.2 of a micrometer.

I'm not sure what those first two things are. They're two different instances of the same kind of critter. Looking at it in motion, it reminds one very much of a pillbug, but it is obviously nothing of the sort. Each of these examples is about 50 micrometers long.

That last picture, I think, is of a diatom. t appears to be about 30 micrometers across.
 

Attachments

  • 20090315_1800_LooksLikeAPillbug.jpg
    20090315_1800_LooksLikeAPillbug.jpg
    40.5 KB · Views: 1,203
  • 20090315_1811_LooksLikeAPillbug.jpg
    20090315_1811_LooksLikeAPillbug.jpg
    47.2 KB · Views: 1,151
  • 20090315_1736_Diatom.jpg
    20090315_1736_Diatom.jpg
    29 KB · Views: 1,153
Diatoms have silica tests. They are often included in toothpaste as an abrasive / filler. You might try diluting a drop of tp and see what you find.
Ben Goldacre in his book "Bad Science" says...'
MRSA looks like a ball.Bacilli look like a rod. You can tell the difference between them using 100X magnification- the Edu Science Microscope Set at ToysRUs for £9.99 will do the job very well. (If you buy one, with the straightest face in the world, I recommend looking at your sperm: it's quite a soulful moment'.
 
The duck-pond sample that I gathered on Sunday has been sitting in a sealed container just outside my front window for a few days.

I took a look tonight at a drop therefrom. The unicellular green algae that I had previously described is behaving differently now. It's gathered into groups. Some of it is still alive and active, some of it seems to be dead, and some of it looks like it's been squished and broken open.

attachment.php


The above picture was taken using the 10X objective and the 15X eyepiece. One pixel = 1.22 micrometers. Each numbered tick on the scale is 122 micrometers.

All the other pictures I am posting tonight were taken with the 60X objective and the 15X eyepiece; 1 pixel = 0.2 micrometers. Where the scale is visible, each numbered tick is 20 micrometers.

Here's a closer look at some of the “squished” algae:

attachment.php


Those numerous tiny objects — about 2 micrometers in diameter — are very lively and active. I'm fairly sure they are some sort of bacteria. Perhaps they are killing the algae.


Here's a view of what I believe to be some other variety of bacteria:

attachment.php



And here's something else I've been seeing in these samples. I've seen them before, but this is the first time I've photographed them:


attachment.php
attachment.php


These are very small, much smaller than the unicellular green algae. Perhaps they are some form of cyanobacteria, (formerly known as “blue-green algae”, but recently reclassified as a bacteria, and no longer considered algae). Most instances of this that I have seen look more like the first example than the second, but it always has four cells, no more and no less.


 

Attachments

  • 20090318_0033_BacteriaKillingAlgae.jpg
    20090318_0033_BacteriaKillingAlgae.jpg
    46.9 KB · Views: 1,126
  • 20090318_0043_BacteriaKillingAlgae.jpg
    20090318_0043_BacteriaKillingAlgae.jpg
    58.8 KB · Views: 1,123
  • 20090318_0033_Bacteria.jpg
    20090318_0033_Bacteria.jpg
    61 KB · Views: 1,123
  • 20090318_0011_4CellAlgae.jpg
    20090318_0011_4CellAlgae.jpg
    37.8 KB · Views: 2,170
  • 20090318_0025_4CellAlgae.jpg
    20090318_0025_4CellAlgae.jpg
    35 KB · Views: 2,152
This cyclops was photographed using the 5X objective and the 10X eyepiece. I estimate each pixel to be 3.45 micrometers, and this Cyclops to have an overall length of about 135 micrometers.
[qimg]http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=13253&stc=1&d=1237105550[/qimg]


Hmmm…

I managed to go badly astray in estimating the size of this critter before. I was off by a factor of more than ten. Depending on whether you count the apparent fringes off of the tail, this critter is, in this image, about 470 to 570- pixels in length. At 3.45 micrometers per pixel, this means the actual length of the critter was about 1.6 to 2 millimeters.

I wonder how I came up with 135 micrometers as my previous estimate.
 
Brings back memories... When I was a kid in the late 50s and early 60s, I was very fond of microscopy; I'd had at least some sort of instrument from childhood. Spent many hours peering at everything I could think of.
Read "Microbe Hunters" around freshman high-school, and found it really inspiring.

Funny story... My mom worked at a "convalescent" hospital that dealt mostly with TB patients. (No effective drugs back then) It was a Catholic hospital, and mom told the nun who ran the lab of my hobby. The lady was very helpful, and would send home tons of slides, test-tubes, pipettes, etc.
One day mom brought home a water sample with the instruction to take a look at it.
I did, and it was filled with all manner of bugs I'd never seen before.

It was holy water from the font.....
 
It appears I have a correction to make. These creatures, which I initially identified as rotifers, I now believe to be Vorticellas.

attachment.php
attachment.php


This creature, which I also identified as a rotifer, I still believe to be a rotifer.

attachment.php


Here is a closer view of a creature that I believe to be a Vorticella:

attachment.php


They also exist in a free-swimming form, called a “telotroch”. I believe that this is an example of that:

attachment.php


These are from the duck-pond sample that I took about a week ago. The two previous pictures were taken with the 60X objective, and the 15X eyepiece. Each pixel is 0.2 of a micrometer. Each numbered tick on the scale is 20 micrometers.

After nearly a week, in a sealed container, nearly all of the unicellular green algae (which had been the dominant life form in this sample) has died off; and no bacteria are by far the most dominant form of life to be found. Most of them have been free-swimming, and not terribly interesting in and of themselves. I did find this unusual arrangement, which consist of bacteria clinging to some very, very fine filaments. I don't know what these filaments are, or how they came into existence. Perhaps the bacteria had something to do with creating them. This picture was taken using the 10X objective and the 15X eyepiece. Each pixel is 1.22 micrometers. Each numbered tick on the scale is 122 micrometers.

attachment.php




I'm not sure what this is. I've seen several of these; each one appears to consist of three cells. This picture was taken with the 60X objective and the 15X eyepiece.

attachment.php



 

Attachments

  • 20090322_0206_Vorticella.jpg
    20090322_0206_Vorticella.jpg
    53.6 KB · Views: 1,044
  • 20090322_0210_Vorticella-Telotroch.jpg
    20090322_0210_Vorticella-Telotroch.jpg
    47.3 KB · Views: 1,044
  • 20090321_2327_BacteriaFilaments.jpg
    20090321_2327_BacteriaFilaments.jpg
    76.1 KB · Views: 1,034
  • 20090321_2216_3CellAlgae.jpg
    20090321_2216_3CellAlgae.jpg
    41.8 KB · Views: 1,032
Ben Goldacre in his book "Bad Science" says...'
I recommend looking at your sperm: it's quite a soulful moment'.

And somebody on the Badscience forums has complained about it - won't give the book to her children because of it and demands he remove it from the next edition. :boggled:

ETA: Which is silly, 'cause it's probably one of the first things a teenage male looks at when he gets a microscope.
 
At North 38°33'51.40" West 121°26'42.17", there is this odd little park. It's just a small island in the middle of a misshapen intersection where the streets apparently didn't line up as they were intended. On this island, someone's put in park benches, and fancy landscaping, and even a fountain.

Today, on my way home from church, I stopped there, to get a sample from that fountain. I found the fountain to have considerably less water than it was supposed to have. I could hear the pump running, but there wasn't enough water to feed it. What water was there, however, was very green, with some nice green scum on the top, leading me to expect that I'd find it to be rich with microscopic critters for me to observe and photograph.

Oddly, the only container I could muster up in which to contain a sample was an empty Simple Green bottle, which was interesting since this water was almost exactly the same color as the product that originally came in that bottle.

I expected that I was going to find a lot of the same unicellular algae that I found in the duck pond sample; and probably a good variety of other things as well.

All that I did find was some sort of non-motile CyanobacteriaWP. That was it. I saw a few dead DaphniaWP, but other than that, no sign of anything that is or was ever alive except for the cyanobacteria.

This picture was taken with the 60X objective and the 15X eyepiece. The numbered ticks on the scale indicate a distance of 20 micrometers.
 

Attachments

  • 20090322_1836_Cyanobacteria.jpg
    20090322_1836_Cyanobacteria.jpg
    60.1 KB · Views: 11
Last edited:
Looks like I've identified a few of the unknowns.

attachment.php
is apparently a Coleps.

(There wasn't a Wikipedia article on this critter, but I have added a stub, which will hopefully get filled in by others who have some actual knowledge of this creature to contribute.)

attachment.php
is apparently an example of Scenedesmus, a eukaryotic algae, and not, as I had supposed, a cyanobacteria. All of the examples that I had observed have exactly four cells, but apparently, it can occur in colonies of anywhere from 2 to 32 cells.
 
Last edited:
Tonight's pictures were all taken with the 60X objective and the 15X eyepiece. Each pixel is about 0.2 micrometers, and each numbered tick on the scale is about 20 micrometers.

This first one is a very curious thing. I guess I am operating right on the very edge of what my microscope can resolve.

attachment.php


Notice the string of dots above the scale. I assume these are very small bacteria, less than a micrometer in size. I can resolve the image just well enough to tell that they are there, but not to discern any detail at all. I don't know what is causing them to arrange as they have in a more-or-less straight line.


Here are some diatoms:
attachment.php



And here's a pretty good close-up of a cyanobacterium:
attachment.php




 

Attachments

  • 20090324_0258_Cyanobacteria.jpg
    20090324_0258_Cyanobacteria.jpg
    36.5 KB · Views: 1,896
  • 20090324_0343_StringOfTinybacteria.jpg
    20090324_0343_StringOfTinybacteria.jpg
    51.4 KB · Views: 974
  • 20090324_0231_Diatoms.jpg
    20090324_0231_Diatoms.jpg
    55.4 KB · Views: 974
Last edited:
From a drainage ditch where I work.

There was very little recognizable life in this sample. I found a few cells like those shown here, which seem to be about as generic and nondescript as a single-celled organism can possibly be. These are about 40 micrometers in diameter. 60X objective used for both these pictures. The one with two cells was taken through the 10X eyepiece, while the one showing one cell was taken through the 15X eyepiece.
 

Attachments

  • 20090325_0024_FromCampbellDitches.jpg
    20090325_0024_FromCampbellDitches.jpg
    39.7 KB · Views: 10
  • 20090325_0037_FromCampbellDitches.jpg
    20090325_0037_FromCampbellDitches.jpg
    48.3 KB · Views: 911
From a pile of buckets and flower pots that a neighbor has carelessly left out in the rain. The 15X eyepiece was used for all these shots; some with the 10X objective and some with the 60X; it should be obvious which are which. The paramecia in these pictures are around 100 micrometers in length.
 

Attachments

  • 20090326_0050_3Paramecia.jpg
    20090326_0050_3Paramecia.jpg
    44 KB · Views: 10
  • 20090326_0056_Paramecium.jpg
    20090326_0056_Paramecium.jpg
    41.4 KB · Views: 6
  • 20090326_0125_Paramecium.jpg
    20090326_0125_Paramecium.jpg
    65.5 KB · Views: 6
  • 20090326_0129_Paramecium.jpg
    20090326_0129_Paramecium.jpg
    33.7 KB · Views: 898
My digital camera had been starting to get a bit flaky. I was blaming it on the CompactFlash card, and looking to buy another one, but it seems that CompactFlash cards are getting scarcer and more expensive, to the point that it just made more sense to buy a new camera. For about sixty bucks at Wal*Mart, I got a Sakar 87690. It has much higher resolution, though it seems to have a considerably more difficult time getting the exposure right when used through the microscope.

Tonight's picture is of a paramecium found in a sample from a drainage ditch on the grounds of the factory where I work.

I even have a video, too, of this same paramecium swimming around and eating.

 

Attachments

  • 20090327_0224_Paramecium.jpg
    20090327_0224_Paramecium.jpg
    29.7 KB · Views: 11
Tonight, I was revisiting some of the vials containing samples from the pat week or so. Not much of interest, really, that I hadn't seen before.

15X eyepiece for all of tonight's pictures.

This first is of some odd little crustacean. This was with the 10X objective. Each numbered tick on the scale is 122 micrometers. I estimate this critter to be about half a millimeter in length.

attachment.php


Next, we have some sort of bacteria. This image and the two following it were made using the 60X objective. Each numbered tick on the scale is 20 micrometers. This one appears to be about 60 micrometers in length.

attachment.php



This next one is shorter, at about 40 micrometers. I suspect I may be seeing it in a very early stage of dividing. The contents of the cell seem to be “pinched”*in the middle.

attachment.php


And I think this example may be at a later point in the division process.

attachment.php




 

Attachments

  • 20090328_0048_UnknownCrustacean.jpg
    20090328_0048_UnknownCrustacean.jpg
    37.4 KB · Views: 898
  • 20090328_0135_Bacterium.jpg
    20090328_0135_Bacterium.jpg
    43.8 KB · Views: 891
  • 20090328_0137_Bacterium.jpg
    20090328_0137_Bacterium.jpg
    39.5 KB · Views: 887
  • 20090328_0142_Bacterium.jpg
    20090328_0142_Bacterium.jpg
    47.6 KB · Views: 887
Last edited:
I think this may be some form of a crustacean, or possibly a tardigrade.

attachment.php



This, I am fairly sure, is a euglena

attachment.php


It's quite small. The main body of the creature seems to be about 50 micrometers long, and the flagellum is a bit longer than that. Counting the flagellum, the whole critter is about 120 micrometers in length.

And here's a paramecium.

attachment.php


All the images up to this point were taken with the 10X objective and the 15X eyepiece. Each numbered tick on the scale is 122 micrometers.

The paramecium in that last picture was an unusually large one. I estimate it to be nearly 200 micrometers in length; about twice what I regard as typical for a paramecium.

This one was alive, but not very active, and it seemed to move (when it moved at all) mostly in circles. I wonder if the bacteria that I saw clinging to it had anything to do with that. You can see a few of them in this image around the 3.2-3.3 ticks.

This last image, of the same paramecium, taken with the 60X objective, gives a better view of these bacteria.

attachment.php


In this last image, each numbered tick is 20 micrometers.



 

Attachments

  • 20090328_1521_Crustacean.jpg
    20090328_1521_Crustacean.jpg
    42.8 KB · Views: 874
  • 20090328_1543_Euglena.jpg
    20090328_1543_Euglena.jpg
    35.9 KB · Views: 868
  • 20090328_1606_Paramecium.jpg
    20090328_1606_Paramecium.jpg
    44.8 KB · Views: 868
  • 20090328_1610_Paramecium.jpg
    20090328_1610_Paramecium.jpg
    43.2 KB · Views: 872
Re: "I'm not sure what this is. I've seen several of these; each one appears to consist of three cells. "

That's pine pollen. See attached. I used to see this in animal feces all the time. I was working as a vet tech by the way, that wasn't a hobby.
 

Attachments

  • HPIM0964.jpg
    HPIM0964.jpg
    63.4 KB · Views: 11
Today, I got it into my head to try to get to the American River, and get a sample therefrom.

One of my other hobbies is Geocaching. In GoogleEarthing to find a plausible route to the river, I discovered that there was a Geocache along the route that I was deciding to use. So, my wife and I decided to get that cache while we were at it.

We never actually made it to the river. The impression I got from Google Earth was that there would be a creek, a park beyond that creek, and a river at the far edge of that park. What we found wasn't anything like a park as we know it. It was just very rough, undeveloped land. As we were crossing it, we realized that the sun was setting, and we didn't want to be crossing such rough terrain in the dark.

The creek was not-quite dry, and I did find some usable samples there, at North 38°35'39.0" West 121°27'50.7".

All of these pictures except the last one were taken with the 10X objective and the 15X eyepiece. Each numbered tick on the scale is 122 micrometers.

This is Spirogyra, a kind of algae. The chloroplasts form a spiral pattern in each cell.

attachment.php




Here is a Daphnia.

attachment.php


I was able to see the heart beating in this critter, as I watched it in my microscope. The dark circle is an air bubble trapped below the cover slip.


I'm not sure what this is, other than that it is some kind of a protozoan. It vaguely resembles a euglena, but that's not what it is. A euglena pulls itself forward with its flagellum, with the flagellum leading ahead of it. This critter swam with the “tail” trailing behind it.

attachment.php



I'm not sure what this is in this last picture either. It's some sort of small, multicellular animal, about 1.5 millimeters in length. I saw it in my vial of creek water, and specifically targeted it with the eyedropper to put it on a hanging-drop slide for viewing. I used the 5X objective and the 5X eyepiece for this one. There's no scale, because that is built into the 15X eyepiece, which I wasn't using this time; but in this picture, as I have posted it, each pixel is 2.68 micrometers. This creature was not transparent enough for the usual from-below form of illumination, so I called my wife over and had her hold the flashlight to illuminate it from above.

attachment.php




 

Attachments

  • 20090328_2222_Spirogyra.jpg
    20090328_2222_Spirogyra.jpg
    41.6 KB · Views: 861
  • 20090328_2227_Daphnia.jpg
    20090328_2227_Daphnia.jpg
    54.5 KB · Views: 860
  • 20090328_2233_Protozoan.jpg
    20090328_2233_Protozoan.jpg
    41.5 KB · Views: 961
  • 20090329_0000_Unknown_Animal.jpg
    20090329_0000_Unknown_Animal.jpg
    44.6 KB · Views: 856
Last edited:
Reading this thread has made me so excited about my son getting older; I can't wait to show him stuff like this :)
 
Some kind of worm, I think. Both pictures taken with the 15X eyepiece; first picture with the 10X objective (numbered tick = 122 micrometers) and the second with the 60X objective (numbered tick = 20 micrometers).

attachment.php
attachment.php


This worm is about 360 micrometers long and about 14 micrometers thick.


A couple more pictures of some spirogyra. 10X objective, 15X eyepiece, numbered tick = 122 micrometers.

attachment.php
attachment.php



And here's some sort of little crustacean. 10X objective, 15X eyepiece, numbered tick = 122 micrometers.

attachment.php




 

Attachments

  • 20090329_1817_Worm.jpg
    20090329_1817_Worm.jpg
    44.9 KB · Views: 824
  • 20090329_1816_Worm.jpg
    20090329_1816_Worm.jpg
    43.1 KB · Views: 817
  • 20090329_1919_Spirogyra.jpg
    20090329_1919_Spirogyra.jpg
    40.8 KB · Views: 814
  • 20090329_1922_Spirogyra.jpg
    20090329_1922_Spirogyra.jpg
    46.5 KB · Views: 815
  • 20090330_0317_Crustacean.jpg
    20090330_0317_Crustacean.jpg
    37.8 KB · Views: 812
Last edited:
Here's where I thank my Dad. He had these cool high-powered microscopes in his lab. I spent many hours looking at amoebae.

Thanks, Dad. I hope I can pass on some of that to my kid.


Cool thread.
 
I was able to see the heart beating in this critter, as I watched it in my microscope. The dark circle is an air bubble trapped below the cover slip.
I think what you saw was more likely to be food moving along the gut - creatures this size are too small to have a blood circulation.

These pictures, and your dedication to collecting, viewing and posting them are simply fantastic. Big respect.

Yuri
 
I was able to see the heart beating in this critter, as I watched it in my microscope. The dark circle is an air bubble trapped below the cover slip.

I think what you saw was more likely to be food moving along the gut - creatures this size are too small to have a blood circulation.

According to the Wikipedia entry on DaphniaWP:
In many species, the carapace is translucent or nearly so and as a result they make excellent subjects for the microscope as one can observe the beating heart.
·
·
·​
Daphnia, like many animals, are prone to alcohol intoxication, and make excellent subjects for studying the effects of the depressant on the nervous system – due to the translucent exoskeleton, and the visibly altered heart rate. … This experiment can also be done using caffeine, nicotine or adrenaline and observing an increase in heart rate.


These pictures, and your dedication to collecting, viewing and posting them are simply fantastic. Big respect.

What is fantastic to me is that I can even take these pictures. I'm aware of some fairly expensive devices that are basically digital cameras specifically designed to mount on a microscope in place of the eyepiece. Our own Kookbreaker sells some of them in his store. It seems that his cheapest one starts at just under a hundred dollars, and they go very rapidly up in price from there, to his top model costing seven hundred dollars. I'm now taking these pictures with a Sakar 87690 that I bought for sixty dollars at Wal*Mart, having just recently upgraded to that from my old Kodak DC3200 that I was previously using.

I imagine that Kookbreaker's digital microscopy attachments are much easier and more convenient to use, but I bet they don't take any better pictures than I'm getting.
 
Last edited:
Re: "I'm not sure what this is. I've seen several of these; each one appears to consist of three cells. "

That's pine pollen.

The bugger in the first image of your last post seems to be some kind of midge larva.


Doing an images.google.com search on "pine pollen" and "midge larva" brought up pictures that look like the objects in question. So it appears that these identifications are correct.

So now I know what
attachment.php
and
attachment.php
are.


Anyone know what
attachment.php
is? This one is still a mystery to me.
 
According to the Wikipedia entry on DaphniaWP:
In many species, the carapace is translucent or nearly so and as a result they make excellent subjects for the microscope as one can observe the beating heart.

I stand corrected - jumping to conclusions again, apologies. It is extremely fitting that a creature as sweet as that should have a beating heart. I once fed a bag of them (they're commonly sold in pet shops as live fish food) to the terrapins I kept in my flat as a student. I've felt guilty about it to this day!

Yuri
 

Back
Top Bottom