Christmas Tree Hand-Sections

[mrsonchus]

Hi all, well, yes, I did give-in to the temptation to take a few hand-sections of the twigs and leaves from our rather withered-looking Christmas tree.....

They really didn't turn out very well I'm afraid, in fact worse than usual, but here they are.

So, what on Earth did I get up to?

Basically took a small twig and the needles still clinging desperately to it and 'gave it the chop'...

Here's the twig etc,


A few sections cut across twig's tiny stem,


and across some needles,


Not the best, in fact pretty thick....


I thought I'd apply a 2-stain mixture of aqueous safranin and aqueous alcian-blue, each at 1% in water then mixed 50/50 (1 drop of each) in water...


Mixing,


Leave in stain for about 10 minutes....


Place onto slide ready to remove as much of the coloured water as possible....


I'm going to use PVA adhesive and coverslip for a temporary mount that will last about 1 week....


Mounted with small weight applied (staples - great because they're easy to pick up and easy to vary by weight)...
They'll be ready to view in about 10 minutes.


I made 4 slides, shame the section quality was so poor but I've seen worse...


Here's a stem TS polarised,


and brightfield,


The needle sections aren't the best either I'm afraid...


and the midvein,


Closer in to the stem section, pretty good uptake of the safranin by the lignified fibers of this rather woody stem/twig....






Well, not the best but at least they were quick to make.

In case anyone is wondering what a proper fully-processed, microtome-cut section looks like, stained with the same two stains, here's one of my permanent slides. This is sectioned at about 10µ and mounted in resin - 'NuMount' in fact...

This is a Daffodil's ovary - the part that swells beneath the trumpet and will contain the seeds at maturity, after the flower has dropped away. Each seed develops from an ovule, many of which are seen along (attached-to) the central (axial) placenta inside the ovary...
This is a cross-section (TS) of the whole ovary,


Here's a single ovule, with an egg-cell that will be fertilised and ultimately mature and become a seed....


Just thought I'd include the permanent slide for comparison...

Hope you like them, at least they're colourful!

John B.

[MichaelG.]

Eagerly awaiting Episode 2

[Hobbyst46]

I love the Christmas tree and needle images!

[MichaelG.]

Eagerly awaiting Episode 2

Edit: ... and when I came back, there it was in all its glory !!
Splendid work, John.

[wporter]

Excellent demonstration, mrsonchus, thank you; and very timely, too! Happy Holidays!

What are those snow-coat slides? Are they coated?

I think that the tree is a fir of some kind.

[apochronaut]

Balsam Fir, I would wager. About 40 miles N.E. of me , where the Canadian Shield begins, they grow by the billions.
You had your mounting medium , right at hand! ....might be the only self mounting microscope specimen.

[MichaelG.]