stained with Fuschin - the backgrounds have been 'everage-blurred' away to clean them
up a bit as they are really pretty bitty and mucky.
The Schlembergera is better known as 'Christmas Cactus' although the variety from which
came this pollen is actually the 'Easter Cactus' - pointed leaf borders instead of the true
rounded lobes of the 'Christmas Cactus' proper....
- Quite a bit of information about the pollen
grains is visible in this mount. - websize_schlembergera_pollen.jpg (258.59 KiB) Viewed 2783 times
that I studied most of last summer (before I got my first 'scope'). These grains are very hard
to image as they are really very small but at the same time very 3-dimensional (unlike the
usual tiny but essentially flat sections of specimens) and the material from which their
'exine' (shell) is constructed plays havoc with light and focus!
On my previous Swift 'scope (my 2nd 'scope) these were really just vague pink blurs but on
the beautiful SP200 they have come to life and show a lot of characteristic features. The
previous Shlembergera pollen is a lot easier to image as the grains are essentially spherical,
without the very complex structure of pits, pores, ridges and spines that cover the Sonchus asper
pollen's exine.
- Finally the SP200 allows me to see what I've seen on the net on my own slides!
- websize_sonchus_asper_4.jpg (112.27 KiB) Viewed 2783 times
view down the 'scope but there the best I can do at the moment.
Hope you like them - sorry to go on about pollen, I just find it fascinating and tend to get a bit
carried away - my family scream and flee if my lips even look like forming the word 'pollen'!
John
