Tube dwelling diatom (Parlibellus berkeleyi ?) images added

Charles Krebs · Post by **Charles Krebs** » Sat Apr 27, 2013 2:51 pm

I collected what appeared to be a brown algae at a "minus" tide. Under the microscope it was quickly revealed that it was a tube-dwelling diatom. There were a great many tubes running parallel to each other, especially in the "thicker" sections. Inside these tubes the diatoms would move slowly back and forth. Quite fascinating.

The first smaller shot shows what the subject looked like under a low power (2.5X) objective. But even here, is still looks like a brown algae with external diatoms randomly attached to the outer surface. The second is a close look with DIC and the 60/1.40 objective. The last two are DIC with a 40X.

Bruce Taylor · Post by **Bruce Taylor** » Sat Apr 27, 2013 3:06 pm

Very interesting! I defy any Frontonia to get his mouth around that.

Sumguy01 · Post by **Sumguy01** » Sat Apr 27, 2013 3:55 pm

Very interesting .
Thanks for sharing .
I'm going to check out tide pools tomorrow a.m.
Hope I can find some .
We have a -3.3 tide tomorrow .

Marek Mis · Post by **Marek Mis** » Sat Apr 27, 2013 9:40 pm

Beautiful images and very interesting subject.

Marek

Jacek · Post by **Jacek** » Sun Apr 28, 2013 7:29 am

interesting and beautiful

curt0909 · Post by **curt0909** » Sun Apr 28, 2013 2:27 pm

I've never seen such a uniform strand of diatoms like this. Usually when I see them in a 'colony' (i'm not sure if that's the right term) they're jumbled together in a clump.

carlos.uruguay · Post by **carlos.uruguay** » Tue Apr 30, 2013 4:17 am

Amazing

Charles Krebs · Post by **Charles Krebs** » Tue Apr 30, 2013 8:14 pm

Thank you for the comments!

Here is another set of images of this subject. This time I used darkfield illumination. 1 and 4 are with a 20X, 2 and 3 are with a 40X.

curt0909 · Post by **curt0909** » Wed May 01, 2013 7:58 pm

The first darkfield shot is an award winner. I prefer the darkfield shots to DIC for these specimens.

pwnell · Post by **pwnell** » Thu May 02, 2013 5:04 pm

I have captured the exact same algae! What a coincidence.