A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

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NachoBen
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A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#1 Post by NachoBen » Sat Feb 25, 2023 2:17 pm

In the last days I've been fascinated by my observations in ponds in Cáceres (Spain) countryside. Specifically, near the city, I have found a cattle pond (rather a puddle, because it will end up drying up in a few weeks) where I have witnessed an explosion of life that I had not observed before anywhere else. This is the place:

Image

I have marked in yellow the specific area where all the samples have yielded an unusual profusion of organisms. Alongside a true Stentor roeseli bloom you find Ophryoglena, Bursaria, Prorodon, Homalozoon, Amphileptus, Paramecium, Phialina, unnumbered Hypotrichia, clouds of Trachelomonas, lots of Placus luciae, multitudes of Arcella, Difflugia and Netzelia (all alive, not empty shells!), various turbellarians, and much more that remains to be determined. You find an abnormal abundance of individuals in bipartition and, in the case of Paramecium, in conjugation.

At the moment, I have two questions:

A. Why is this happening? In fact, the samples from the rest of the pond do not present this explosion, they are quantitatively and qualitatively much poorer.

B. What is the organism in this video?


I suspect that it may be Ophryoglena with many dark vacuoles. The core is amazing indeed.

Thank you!

PeteM
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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#2 Post by PeteM » Sat Feb 25, 2023 5:48 pm

The shallow end of the "pond" likely has an ideal combination of abundant nutrients and shallow depth for sun to penetrate? Also looks like animal tracks at that end - perhaps some critter introduced some additional critters to the food chain? A third possibility is that as the pond dries, protists are somewhat trapped and concentrated in the shallow end of the pool?

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#3 Post by Dennis » Sun Feb 26, 2023 10:35 am

Nacho Ben,

Well this is all fantastic !

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#4 Post by NachoBen » Mon Feb 27, 2023 8:31 am

Thank you, PeteM and Dennis.

You are right, PeteM. I think the point is depth (this is the shallowest part of the pond) and nutrients.

Cows come to drink to this side and trample it, creating microhabitats in the hoofprints, with much or less water in them. In fact, you could chart a differential map of hoofprints, each one with its dimensions and sunlight exposure. Many of the cows come from other ponds and possibly bring new microorganisms in their mudded hooves. Not to mention sheeps and birds.

In addition, there is a nutrient input (manure), distributed irregularly.

This winter is being cold and sunny in this part of Spain. Low temperatures do not affect microorganisms much, but they do affect the concentration of gases in the water. And sunlight favors the growth of algae.

I'm sure there are many other factors eluding me.
As I always say: I have a lifetime to learn.

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#5 Post by Bruce Taylor » Mon Feb 27, 2023 6:13 pm

The mouth appears to be apical (at the anterior of the cell), and it has a posterior CV, so it is not Ophryoglena. Also, members of that genus tend to rotate along their longitudinal axis, which this fellow is not doing. I believe this is probably a dark specimen of Prorodon niveus (known in many older texts as Pseudoprorodon niveus). In the earlier part of the video we glimpse the fan-shaped nematodesmata that support the oral region. The long macronucleus is typical of that genus (and distinguishes it from Holophrya).

There has been a lot of confusion between Prorodon, Holophrya and Pseudoprorodon, because of an old taxonomic error. In general, descriptions of "Prorodon" species in texts from the 20th century are very likely to belong in the family Holophryidae (Holophrya, etc.), and descriptions of "Pseudoprorodon" should be regarded as belonging to Prorodon.

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#6 Post by NachoBen » Mon Feb 27, 2023 7:10 pm

Quite interesting that you mention Prorodon niveus, Bruce. This species is one of the critters I first identified in this blooming. Moreover, it has very clear features so I could identify it unmistakeablely even though I had never met it before. Here is a video:



The funny thing is that this new and almost black specimen of "niveus" is not "snowy" at all!

Thank you!

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#7 Post by Bruce Taylor » Mon Feb 27, 2023 8:36 pm

> is not "snowy" at all!

A good point! This one should be named "Prorodon anthracinus." :D More seriously, I am not actually sure that such dark cytoplasm has been recorded for the species, so there is room for doubt about the identification. P. niveus is not a species I encounter in my own samples, so I have no experience with possible variations within a population. And, while it is an old and well known species, it has not been described in detail very often.

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#8 Post by NachoBen » Mon Feb 27, 2023 10:43 pm

So the search never ends...

Thanks again, Bruce.

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#9 Post by apochronaut » Wed Mar 01, 2023 1:26 pm

Probably the 2 critical factors regarding the burgeoning life in the pond foreground are temperature and nutrient loading as Pete mentioned. That shallow end has been somewhat artificially created by compression under cattle hooves allowing the manure to be compressed and mixed into the mud. The manure concentration would be much higher and stay much higher at the wading end than at the diving end. Heat from cattle manure and the sun would build up and energize the local environment. It's a good thing there are no pigs around!

Here, nothing grows green at this time of year except some montrous horse radish roots that ended up in the middle of a fast moving stream that never freezes about 20 years ago. Once the sun does start to shine though, various depressions, ditches, vessels or buckets, left out with organic matter in them such as leaves, compost, bird droppings become green and lively, inversely proportional to their size and or depth. Kind of microcosms of that pond.

At some point the situation can reverse and the nutrient level can be too high. Lagoons attached to barns that collect manure leachate, often have nothing obvious growing on or in them, even if emptied only once a year. The same with septic tanks. Microscopically, they are pretty dead because the urea level is so high. I'm sure the organisms surviving there are pretty unique, like those hot spring weirdos. That barn liquor gets spread pretty thin on the land. It is very valuable mixed with straw for mushroom culture.

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#10 Post by NachoBen » Fri Mar 03, 2023 4:30 pm

A very interesting and authoritative explanation, apochronaut. You mentioned some factors that I did not consider. I will do from now on.

Unfortunately I have had to interrupt my observations in that area. I am eager to return to it and continue discovering its microwonders. As soon as I can do it, I will report everything interesting that appears.

Thank you very much to all.

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#11 Post by Dennis » Thu Mar 09, 2023 1:13 am

Nacho Ben,
I would love to get that look you get with your microscope and camera!

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#12 Post by NachoBen » Thu Mar 09, 2023 8:34 am

Thank you, Dennis.

I went back to the pond a couple of days ago but only had time to take a sample. As you can see in this video, the show goes on, although less spectacular than two weeks ago.



As far as I can see, in this party there are Paramecium (sort of) multimicronucleatum, Paramecium caudatum, Amphileptus pleurosigma, Placus luciae, Trachelomonas hispida and other euglenophytes, the amoeba Arcella hemisphaerica, the rotifer Rotaria rotatoria, and many other minor critters. Of course, any correction and/or addition to my identifications will be very welcome.

Nothing extraordinary but very nice to see. I think it will be interesting to follow the evolution of the microbiota as spring approaches.

Greetings and nice microlandscapes for you all!

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#13 Post by WWWW » Thu Mar 09, 2023 8:57 am

What a lot of life in that drop of water, very nice !

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#14 Post by Dennis » Thu Mar 09, 2023 10:08 pm

Hail Hail
The gangs all here !

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#15 Post by Mandintine » Fri Mar 10, 2023 6:28 pm

Beautiful!

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Re: A pond not only teeming but boiling with life, and a new critter

#16 Post by PeteM » Sat Mar 11, 2023 4:42 am

Ben, I just to a look at your YouTube channel.

Wow! This should be a lot of fun (from protists to volcanos) for our "Micronauts.

Thanks for putting the work into all those video clips.

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