First of all, on October 22nd, a beta food pellet was added to the tank. More information on the pellet itself can be found at the bottom of this post!
I got to examine my little darter guy much more today. When I first put my tank under the microscope, I got a good look at him, as he was staying still. I suppose he woke up soon after, though and started darting again. When I got my turn at the camera-microscopes, I was able to take a couple pictures of a neat worm-like guy I found. He's an aeolosoma, and Dr. McFarland helped me identify it. He also helped me figure out what my little darter guy was: a cyclops!
Here are a couple pictures I took of my aeolosoma with the microscope cameras:
There were also amoebas in my tank, but that's about it. I mostly just focused on tracking my cyclops during this visit, mainly because I wanted a good picture of it. He never did stay still, though! Drats.
When checking out the food pellet that was in the tank, I only saw a few amoeba checking it out, which would be a little weird, except it was just barely touching the water! I think the pellet didn't go very far into the water when it was added, and then some of the water dried and the water level lowered a bit, putting the pellet mostly out of reach of my tank's little organisms. Oh well. I suppose it won't have a very strong impact on the daily life of my tank, as it isn't really within reach anymore. Perhaps with the little bit of added nutrients my organisms will be happier, anyway.
Additional identifying information about my cyclops and aeolosoma was taken from:
Smith, Douglas. Pennak's Freshwater Invertebrates of the United States, 4 ed. John Wiley & Sons, Inc: 2001.
Beta food pellet information: "Atison's Betta Food" made by Ocean Nutrition, Aqua Pet Americas, 3528 West 500 South, Salt Lake City, UT 84104. Ingredients: Fish meal, wheat flower, soy meal, krill meal, minerals, vitamins and preservatives. Analysis: Crude Protein 36%; Crude fat 4.5%; Crude Fiber 3.5%; Moisture 8% and Ash 15%.
