microscopic views

[Ronald]

My microscope finally came in. I set it up on a horizontal stand (weighs about 90 pounds) in front of my tank to get upclose and personal with my dendronephthia. :D Some initial observations.... at 67x it is clear there are 8 tenticles on each polyp head each having 8-10 small perpendicular projections from each tenticle. The polyps do in fact retract and expand like xenia. They also can move the tenticles individually in a sudden jerking motion toward the disk. This was much more frequent after feeding. The size of finally crushed flake food is small enough for them too consume, and I saw some definite capture and feeding on a few particles, then my light source blew a fuse!! :mad: It's too late now to get another until tomorrow. I hope it isn't going to need to be sent back! At least the scope is working.

Photography is a little tricky because the digital camera keeps trying to auto focus, and the image only fills the small center part of the field. The pics are not nearly as good as the image through the scope, but I am still working on it. I will try to see different foods (phytoplankton, marine snow, baby brine shrimp etc. to see which resullts in the best feeding response. Any suggestions as to how to proceed would be greatly appreciated.

Ron

[Anthony Calfo]

Outstanding :) Let me suggest that you atempt to capture a time elapsed series of photos for documentation to verify that that captured prey is actually digested.

Prey capture and digestion are two very different things... some Acroporids for example have been shown to capture phytoplankton... but release it many inutes/hours later without consuming it.

Focus on a sigle specimen and track its progress for at least one year... longer would be better of course.

Best regards,

Anthony

[Ronald]

I will be observing the only specimen of Dendronephthya coral I have. I will need to upgrade my digital camera to avoid vinette?spelling? artifact as currently I am going from a large lens to a 30mm lense from the scope and can only image the center of my camera's CCD! I will purchase a smaller lens system and a new adapter hopefully I can return the other adapter. I'll keep you posted, I'm not sure I have enough disk space for a year long time elapsed series.:p But seriously folks, I will try to zoom in on a few polyps, maybe get a movie of the polyp tenticular contractions. Thanks for the feedback!

[Ronald]

It turns out for relatively little money I can get a dedicated CCD that feeds directly to a lap top and will record time elapsed images at any interval I choose. I can't very well do it all night (Idon't want to disturb the livestock) I will figure something out to minimize effects on the fish and symbiotic corals.