MicrobeHunter.com Microscopy Forum

Spherical diatoms definitely do exist. Most form chains, as for instance in freshwater Melosira , but it looks like some also occur as single cells, like Podosira from seaweeds. Apparently auxospores can also be rounded, but I do not know much about how they look. In any case, though, I think the lo...

Interesting. I don't think it is Codosiga , which have small oval cells on a thread-like stalk. This looks more like Anthophysa , or Anthophysis they were originally called, which usually have coarse yellow stalks of the sort this one is indirectly attached to. I imagine this would then be a group t...

The forum is not doing anything strange here; even if I make an HTML page with img tags directly, nothing shows up. The problem is that the locations you are using aren't actually images, but webpages from google photos that display the images. So for instance that last link goes here , but the imag...

I will second this being a flatworm. I think though the narrow head and round pharynx, which make it look somewhat like Mesostoma , are just how it is contracted in this picture. The small size for a worm, eye shape, and especially the hint of papillae on the tail instead suggest some type of Dalyel...

There are a many ciliates that are large enough if the light catches them right. Among hypotrichs various common types get 0.3-0.4 mm in length, sometimes more in tailed genera like Uroleptus; the very largest figure I know about is 0.85 mm for the rare Urostyla gigas.

This is one of the hypotrich ciliates. In contrast to cylindrical Paramecium , they are usually flattened with anterior membranelles and ventral cirri (compound cilia, more easily seen than single ones). The pictures also show a definite forward oral cavity, and a single water expulsion vesicle behi...

am curious what that "I dont know 200x" is. A predatory ciliate? @Bruce Taylor or Josh will likely know. Well, I do not really know, but here is what I can reason out. Said object does not look like anything on its own, but more like a fragment of something larger. From the texture I'd say it is fr...

Was it moving? It looks a lot like a euglyphid, shelled amoebae that pull themselves slowly with filopodia when they travel at all.

Did you see it enter? Because my impression is that this looks a lot like a ciliate escaping from a resting cyst; it would be an unusual test, having almost no opening to pass out through.

I will second hkv here. Euglena vary a great deal in size; some species are as small as 20 µm or so, while for instance E. ehrenbergi can reach 400 µm in length. Especially in these longer types, movement is often by metaboly – flexing and changing shape – and the flagellum is then often short and h...

Seb, an interesting find and nicely shown. 75RR, this is an immature fly. The problem IDing it is that it is not strictly a larva but a pupa, as shown by the developing wings, and these can look a fair bit different. I do not know a general guide, but this one looks a lot like pictures of Ceratopogo...

Hi Aenima, To make the embed work you only include the last part of the URL: [ youtube ]zUzfRAezL8Q[ /youtube ] But it turns out it can be nice to include a link anyway just in case that doesn't work for some browsers. I will have to let someone else critique the phase contrast, but the larger cilia...

This is an egg, and you can see the beginnings of segments inside, which are characteristic of arthropods like insects. I don't have the expertise to say exactly which kind, but for instance you can find pictures of midge eggs (though usually in masses) that look much like this, complete with the ot...

Yes, I think so. As for the movement in the rotifer, your close-up shows some little ovals on mostly the right side, and I expect these would be scavenging protozoa. They can often be seen inside dead rotifers and arthropods where there is a tougher lorica or exoskeleton left behind. You can expect ...

The first image is indeed a copepod, and in particular a nauplius larva, an early stage with only three pairs of appendages. The desmids are Closterium . The statoblast is from a plumatellid – these are their resting stages, much like asexual eggs, with the little polygons around the outside acting ...

There are many different ciliates that crawl with cirri in the spirotrich class. Stylonychia is still a legitimate type, but they and their closer relatives are not nearly so compact. I think this is probably Euplotes , which are generally more oval and often have grooves; for freshwater kinds they ...

I will add that what you find doesn't just vary over time but depends heavily on where you look. Paramecium for instance love bacteria films and do not form cysts; my experience is that they are common among algae or dense plants from standing water like marshes, but rare in more temporary puddles o...

These look a lot like injuries from some attack. Since they are so common in your samples I am inclined to say tardigrades, which feed by piercing, some as herbivores and some as carnivores. Nematodes can definitely be prey; I couldn't find much detail, but some photos of attacks here and here , and...

This is too solid and small to be a rotifer colony. These sorts of little round objects are hard to identify since many pollen, cysts, and eggs can be similar, and guides focus on the more distinctive mature stages. So it's often better to try relating them to what's around them. In this case, some ...

Rotifers that move like inchworms (or leeches, which gives them their name) are in general Bdelloidea, and are very typical of terrestrial habitats since they can survive drying out. Here are some pages I know of that should help for identifying rotifers in general: Plingfactory: The Rotifers of Ger...

Hi Lilly, The zoomers are Colpoda or some other member of their family, which generally look very similar. They are very common in terrestrial habitats like puddles, wet plant material, and so on. Water in such places tends to be transient, and so while in most ciliates division happens on the go, t...

Interesting. The shape, pharyngeal basket, and colour look much like Nassulopsis , though I can't make out characteristic features like the water expulsion vesicles or line of compound cilia. Do they ever fold on their mouths like this? I have not seen so myself, but found a video by microuruguay th...

This is a nice video with a lot to see in it. It evidently has a few different types of bdelloids; normally I wouldn't claim I could identify any, but from 1:10-1:20 there is an unusual one in the lower right I think may be an Adineta , from the way it slides without any evident wheels instead of st...

But then as it says a single report, never repeated, and now considered superseded by some very good genetic evidence otherwise. In any case you can see at least these are not some strange dwarf males; photos like the first nicely show the paired ovaries characteristic of (female) bdelloids on eithe...

If I am understanding this correctly: You appear to have some Male specimens in your herd These rotifers are bdelloids. They don't have any males at any point – a clever look at chromosome divergence confirmed there hasn't been the sort of shuffling associated with sexual reproduction since the Mes...

Very nice indeed! Unable to ID ... any ideas? It looks like some Keratella with one posterior spine, which often carry eggs ventrally like you see here. You can also see the typical anterior spines and lorica facets, if only in part – which I think is a fair trade for such an uncommonly good view o...

I know I've seen the occasional little discose amoeba in aquarium debris, somewhat Mayorella - or Korotnevella -like, and in one case lots of the heliozoans Actinophrys among algae films. But whether or not they are more common, testate amoebae are generally more conspicuous. A discose amoeba often ...

These are indeed lovely images. I'll second Polyarthra ; the first is a Lepadella with the head extended. You can see the notch for the foot and the two red eyespots very well, both of which are characteristic. In Euchlanis the foot emerges from a wider space between the lorica plates and there is a...

The first diatom is a very nice Amphora , but they don't really have that sort of side to sit on. It's true the isolated valves are crescent-shaped, but in an intact cell they are tilted apart to face the same way; compare for instance an SEM . Your second photo shows no sign of that shape, but sits...

It looks a lot like the stalk from a colonial peritrich but with all the ciliates removed. Most pictures focus on the living cells and so don't show this level of detail for the stalks, but at least some Epistylis do show this same kind of fine pattern.