Scuticociliates

[gekko]

Scuticociliates (Pleuronema, many thanks to charlie g for the identification) from bird's bath water. DIC, 40x objective.

[75RR]

Very good photograph! Works very well in BW.
Especially like how two are still and one is racing away, gives it a great dynamic.

... from bird's bath water

Shouldn't that be squirrel? ;)

[Rodney]

Very nice, I like BW, to me gives a more natural depth of field of what the creature actually looks like without the color. I sometimes wonder with all the color if that is what the creature actually looks like since color is associated with light, but color does look good.

Rodney

[vasselle]

Bonjour Gekko.
Superbe photo.
Et le DIC est super ainsi que le rendu en noir et blanc,j'aime beaucoup.
Le mouvement du spécimen en bas apporte une dynamique à l'image.
Bravo pour votre travail et merci pour le partage.
Cordialement seb

[gekko]

Thank you all for your encouraging comments. I did not convert the image to B&W as there was no color other than color fringes due to chromatic aberration (which I tried to remove in Adobe Elements).
I promised 75RR to give more information about objectives, etc. but I apologize that I forgot. Here they are: objective Nikon CF planachromat 40x/0.65. Shutter speed 1/50 s at 800 ISO.

The only reason I posted this image was that it showed nicely the undulating membrane, which, as I understand it, is involved either in locomotion or in sweeping food particles into the oral cavity.
http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/mag/ind ... ptus2.html

75RR: I decided not to install a bird bath (the ones I've seen are some kind of plastic and I didn't want to have to take them out in case of high wind). I got the water from a drinking fountain at the flea market. The drain used to be always clogged with tree leaves, and birds would come to drink and bathe in the standing water, hence "bird bath". That was three years ago. It used to be a great source for all kinds of critters, especially rotifers and Haematococcus. Now, unfortunately, they capped it, so no more bird bath critters

[charlie g]

Nice ciliates,gekko...with all the mosquitos ( I,m still itchy on my knuckles after yesterdays chores and doggie hike)...with all those mosquitoes...it's perhaps good you do not have a home bird-bath. But if you ever change your mind...terra cotta basins are low cost...and you place two rather heavy flat rocks smack in the middle of the basin...no wind will tip that basin off it's pier that way.

As you have three specimens together...we have a lot of exterior anatomy to help with a genus ID. For me symetry ( your protists are ellipsoid to ovoid (not really 'long')...the three in your image all have that undulating membrane on 'their left side'..their size ( your view is with a 40X objective)...the length of the 'mouth'...the rather distinct anterior pole dense structure...well I opine you have Pleuronema genus of hymenostomatida ciliates. Kudo's "Protozoology", 5th ed, pages 913-914. Just my two cents based on my cluttered study of protist texts...and I sure do miss the now out of fashion term: protozoology...thank you Dr.Richard Roksabro Kudo.

In our out of control finger lakes/US garden...we have a few hardy guppies in the bird bath...they handel mosquito larvae quite efficiently. If you revisit a garden bird bath...keep the guppies in it ( a mini fish pond). all the best, charlie guevara

[JimT]

I agree with all the comments. Nice image!

[gekko]

charlie and JimT, many thanks for your comments.
charlie, I appreciate your correction of my guess (actually I never knew how to distinguish Pleuronema from Cyclidium (I wrongly guessed the latter simply because it seemed to be more often pictured-- a bad reason). Thank you for the additional, useful information. And thanks for your tips on a bird bath. I've corrected the original post to reflect the correct ID.

[charlie g]

It's our shared microscopy world views that are a great part of this forum experience (my opinion), gecko...pretty please do not ever sense I'm a taxonomist! I'm sure you'll notice in so many of my shared microscopy world views...I omit a binomial (Genus,species) of the protists, or other meiofauna encountered...often I just use a family level, or order level of descriptive for the wee beasties I encounter.

And so I plug: "Protozoology", R.R.Kudo, 5th edition..it's available online extremely low cost..and it is so easy to use...just go to a section whose illustrations resemble a protest you encountered.

thanks for you onlist and offlist sharing, gecko! charlie guevara