Things were very quiet in the woods as the cold and snow set in. On a whim I decided to take a few water samples and put them under the microscope. This meant breaking some ice to get to the actual water. To my delight, I discovered a lot of activity.
| One sample yielded a paramecium party. The screen was filled with small organisms zooming around like bumper cars. Paramecia are often abundant in stagnant basins and ponds, according to Wikipedia. “A paramecium is a free-living, motile, single-cell (unicellular) organism belonging to the kingdom Protista that are naturally found in aquatic habitats. They have a lifespan of a hundred, a thousand or even a million years,” said a post on www.sciencefacts.net. The post said that paramecia travel using their cilia. It also explained the bumper car-like movements. “The coordinated action of cilia propels the organism forward in a counterclockwise fashion. The Paramecium spirals through the water as it progresses. On hitting an obstacle, it reverses the beat of cilia to swim backward for a brief time before resuming its forward progress. If it runs into an obstacle again, it repeats this process, until it can get past the object,” continued the post. In another water sample, I came upon a funnel shaped critter known as a stentor. Stentor (previously known as "trumpet animalcules") is a genus of trumpet-shaped, ciliated protists common to most of the world, according to a post on Wikipedia. “A stentor is a single-celled freshwater protozoan belonging to the phylum Ciliophora, commonly found in ponds and slow-moving water bodies,” said a post on biologyinsights.com. “Its trumpet or horn shape can extend significantly when attached to a surface…. The stentor primarily exists in an attached state, using its holdfast to anchor to submerged plants or debris. However, these organisms are also capable of detaching and swimming freely, at which point they typically assume a more oval or pear shape,” the post explained. The post went on to mention that the stentor has a remarkable ability to regenerate lost body parts. Meanwhile, other samples pulled from the icy waters revealed a critter that I had seen before, a rotifer. I likened the rotifer’s look like a walrus with two mouths that rotate. “Rotifers are commonly known as wheel animals …the name ‘rotifer’ derives from a Neo-Latin word meaning ‘wheel-bearer’ due to their characteristic ciliated crowns that resemble rotating wheels. These cilia are used for both locomotion and feeding,” said a post on animalfact.com . Rotifers are mostly found in freshwater habitats, according to the post. “Rotifers primarily filter-feed on algae, bacteria, protozoans, phytoplankton, and organic detritus ... They modify their feeding behavior depending on environmental conditions and prey abundance,” the post explained. |  Paramecia  Stentor  Rotifer |
 Diatom |  Diatoms |
More samples displayed a variety of diatoms. These stunning artistic diatoms belong to a very large genera of algae.
It was nice to have some photo subjects who weren't frozen. It was good to know that while some woodland creatures are sleeping, others are busy surviving under the ice. That's the nature of things 'round here.
It was nice to have some photo subjects who weren't frozen. It was good to know that while some woodland creatures are sleeping, others are busy surviving under the ice. That's the nature of things 'round here.
See some of Nature of Things writer, Anna Applegate's work ate Nature Art Showcase.
At The Barrow-Civic Theatre, Franklin, Pa.
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