Slow-stepper
Doesn’t the title sound like it describes most nature nerds? I sure think so. LOL.
Protozoa! This group includes a lot of tiny creatures. The sizes range from one micron to giant ones (20 cm) that can be found in the ocean.
Protozoa, even bigger! At first I thought this was going be a tardigrade, but no legs.
Paramecium are unicellar ciliates. Look carefully around the edges of the critters in the middle. Hopefully you can see the cilia (tiny hairs). So the hairs makes me lean to a Paramecium, a type of protozoa.
Nematode! Most species feed on microorgansims. Interestingly enough these roundworms feed from both ends. They range in size from 0.1 to 2.5mm.
The name tardigrade was coined by a French guy. Tardi means slow and grade means step. Thus slow-stepper. However as fast as it moves I would think fast-stepper. LOL. Compared by body size I would totally be out of breath if I moved that fast. Two other common names that have been used include water bear and moss piglet. Jeanne had found one in a moss a few years ago. However I had always heard they were on lichens as well. Most of time, well every time I identify a lichen I dump on harsh chemicals. No wonder I didn’t find them. But while researching a lichen I found that the Teloschistes was a common place to find them. Moreover they were right!
So I found five tardigrades with sizes ranging from 176 microns to over 325 microns. In fact, they are easy to spot with the compound microscope. Moreover I believe I had at least two different species. But it’s awfully hard to see the features as fast as they move. In this case all the tardigrades were found on Teloschistes. Of course I will be looking on other lichens.
A new study sheds light on how tardigrades are near indestructible
Bizarre Fossils Are Neither Plant Nor Animal, But a ‘Weird Fusion’ of Life
A Bird’s-Eye View of a Technicolor World
Keep looking!
The more you know, the more you see and the more you see, the more you know
Cute water creatures. I’ve never heard of tardigrades. What fun to look thru telescope.
It really is! 🙂
That secret hidden world is truly fun. Busy little critters all!
So cute! I’ve always loved tardigrades but I also appreciated your other microscopy videos!
Fascinating creatures all!
Very cool post! Where did you get the sample you were viewing and recording? Or was it samples from multiple locations?
I collected these here at home. Some protozoa species were from foliose lichens too. Because I did some editing and pasting of the best moments I can’t tell you which came from which. But all the lichens had similar creatures with the exception of the tardigrades. They were only found this time on the Teloschistes.
Delightful!!