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MicroAquarium Observation 10.29.09
*included photographs are from last week, I could not make it to take pictures this time as it was quite busy.*

Complete water source information:
11. Fountain City Duck Pond. West of Broadway at Cedar Lane. Knox Co. Knoxville TN Full sun exposure. Spring Feed Pond N36 02.087 W83 55.967 963 ft 10/12/2009

In the third week of existence, there has been quite a bit of change and organisms in the MicroAquarium appear to be decaying. Plant B has expanded greatly across the left side of the MicroAquarium (even extending a stem out of the water at the top) while Plant A has remained the same size. There appears to be clods of debris (dirt? fungi?) in small clouds across the aquarium, near the plant stems and just above the dirt. There are small, short dark stems poking out from the dirt. The smallest mobile organisms observed previously (yet to be identified) are now much more mobile and numerous, swarming around the stems of Plant A, rather than hiding underneath leaves. (faintly pictured left)

Another observation yet to be identified are the acorn-like heads attached to long strings, which have now also greatly multiplied around plant A.

These ostracods were the most common organism found in my aquarium last week, but this week there were hardly any found. When once there were probably 10-15, there were probably about 5 now. And although this picture reveals them to be quite dark and spotted, they were more transparent last week when this was taken, but now resemble this photograph much more closely. They are also quite a bit less active and appear to be mostly stationary closer to the dirt. I was not able to locate this daphnia (which I'm sure did not actually consume this ostracod, it must be an illusion of the microscope!) in this photograph.

The leaves from the stems of plant A appear to be browning as the ostracods are, possibly decaying, with tiny circles at the end of the leaves. The previously illustrated purple pods have now mostly turned green and have evolved from their spherical shape into a more elongated, squished shape. The dirt at the bottom is more sparse and contains a few leaves fallen from the plants. The rotifer previously pictured living in the dirt was no longer found.