0:00 in this video i'm going to show you how
0:01 you can grow thousands of paramecia so
0:04 that you have plenty of things to
0:05 observe under the microscope and later
0:08 on in the video i'm also going to give
0:09 you some culturing and some observation
0:11 tips as well so you might want to watch
0:13 until the very end of the video of
0:15 course hello and welcome micropuncher
0:16 here and welcome to the microscopy
0:18 advice and observation channel
0:21 now there might be the problem that a
0:23 water sample that you would like to
0:25 observe under the microscope simply does
0:27 not have enough interesting water life
0:29 to look at there can be a variety of
0:32 reasons for this during winter time
0:34 generally there are not so many water
0:36 organisms
0:37 in a pond or in a lake or you might
0:41 simply have a too low of a concentration
0:43 of
0:44 microorganisms in a water sample and
0:46 therefore the water sample might look a
0:48 little bit boring and uninteresting
0:51 luckily it is quite easily possible to
0:54 culture pyramidia these are
0:55 single-celled
0:57 microorganisms it's quite easy to
0:58 culture them and in this video i'm going
1:00 to show you what you can do here now why
1:03 pyramicia pyremicia are quite common and
1:06 popular
1:07 specimens to observe under the
1:08 microscope they're single-celled
1:10 protests and they're good for
1:12 observation because even though they're
1:14 single-celled they're relatively large
1:16 and therefore you can observe quite well
1:19 what's happening inside the cell they
1:21 also like to move
1:23 around and they respond to the
1:25 environment and in other words they're
1:27 quite fun and interesting to watch as
1:29 well
1:30 permission they feed off a decaying
1:32 plant material and when you collect a
1:35 water sample from a pond or from a
1:37 stream
1:39 then you have to also take along not
1:41 only the water but also
1:43 some solid plant material as well um so
1:46 for example some decaying leaves or some
1:49 pieces of wood and so on usually can you
1:52 can find them also grow in the sediment
1:55 of the pond or of the river or a stream
1:59 where you collect the sample so collect
2:01 some material from the bottom of the
2:03 water
2:04 now you need to add a little bit of food
2:06 so when you have the water sample in
2:08 your jar
2:10 then i would suggest that you add some
2:13 food like for example a crushed wheat
2:16 grain or some breakfast cereal maybe
2:19 even a corn flake should also work
2:21 because what happens when you add the
2:24 food is is that bacteria starts to grow
2:26 on the food and the pyremicia they feel
2:29 will feed off the bacteria and then they
2:31 will also start to reproduce and to
2:33 divide
2:35 it's quite easy to do all you do is you
2:37 take the cereal and you simply drop it
2:41 into the water sample and this way
2:43 you're establishing a small food chain
2:45 the bacteria feed off the starch of the
2:47 food and then the parmesan feed of the
2:48 bacteria and yeah
2:51 after a few days after approximately
2:53 three or four days um you have to then
2:56 put a small sample of the food under the
2:59 microscope and then if you're lucky
3:02 then you're going to see a lot of
3:04 paramecia maybe even hundreds of them
3:07 you know that
3:09 you're ready to observe
3:10 this when the cereal that you put in
3:14 starts to form a so-called slime layer
3:16 it starts to change around in texture it
3:18 looks a little bit
3:20 not quite appetizing but this is a sign
3:22 that there is actually quite something
3:23 going on here and that there are
3:24 probably many ciliates not only
3:26 paramecia but also probably other
3:28 ciliates and in this
3:31 slime layer that you basically now have
3:34 forming around the cereal
3:36 of course you want to use tweezers to
3:38 take out the food and you simply dip it
3:41 a little bit on the glass slide you put
3:43 a cover glass on top and of course the
3:45 rest of the food goes back into the
3:47 water sample and then you would of
3:49 course you would like to observe
3:50 everything under low magnification
3:52 because
3:53 this gives you the best overview and
3:55 because the cells they move around so
3:57 quickly
3:58 that
3:59 by using a low magnification you're able
4:00 to see simply more
4:02 of
4:03 the microscope slide so now i'm going to
4:05 give you uh 10
4:07 tips that should help you to grow and to
4:11 enrich those paramecia tip number one
4:14 really make sure that the paramecia and
4:16 the cells receive enough oxygen
4:19 this is really important
4:20 and you can ensure that by not using too
4:23 much water because if you have too much
4:25 water in the bottom of the jar the
4:28 bottom part of the water on the jar will
4:30 not receive a lot of oxygen because the
4:32 oxygen is not able to diffuse so well
4:34 all the way to the bottom
4:36 also do not over feed because when you
4:38 add too much foods and too many bacteria
4:40 are going to form and they will also use
4:42 up a lot of the oxygen and this will
4:44 inhibit the growth of the pyramicia you
4:47 might also consider to include a few
4:49 algae some green material plant material
4:52 maybe as well because
4:54 photosynthesis will happen and then the
4:57 plants will produce oxygen as well i
4:59 found that uh the pyremician not only
5:02 like to gather around the food but also
5:04 around the algae and
5:06 other yeah plant material that you have
5:08 in the water sample so tip number two
5:11 make sure that you do not have any water
5:14 fleas or other water crustaceans in
5:17 the water sample because they like to
5:19 feed on the paramecia yeah you can see
5:22 them quite easily because they're quite
5:24 large the water flees around the
5:25 millimeter in size
5:27 yeah it's simply something to take into
5:29 consideration
5:30 so tip number three you play please do
5:33 consider that the source of the water
5:36 must be cool must be right
5:38 if you have a small puddle that just has
5:41 formed after a rainfall then you're not
5:43 going to find a lot of paramecia here or
5:45 actually none at all because paramecia
5:48 are not able to form cysts and they're
5:50 not able to withstand periods of dryness
5:53 so the water body of water that you use
5:56 to collect the water sample should be
5:58 yeah a permanent body of water like a
6:01 small pond or so also do not use any
6:03 sewage water not only for health reasons
6:06 but also sewage water often does not
6:08 contain a lot of oxygen because the
6:11 bacterial concentration is so high and
6:14 pyremicia often like also to have
6:16 reasonably clean water
6:18 and clean and oxygen-rich water and
6:20 switch water simply is not suitable and
6:22 i think it's also not very healthy
6:24 tip number four um keep checking um so
6:27 if you do not see any interesting water
6:29 life today then wait until tomorrow
6:31 because there is going to be a
6:32 progression of microorganisms
6:35 certain microorganisms will grow and
6:37 they will overgrow the others and others
6:39 will again disappear so over the course
6:42 of a week or two weeks you are actually
6:44 going to see that
6:45 different microorganisms start to
6:47 increase in number and paramecia are
6:50 generally one of the dominant forms that
6:52 you're able to find
6:54 of course tip number five do try
6:56 different types of food as well it does
6:58 not only have to be only have to be a
7:00 crushed wheat grain but you can also add
7:02 a very small amount of milk just make
7:04 sure that it's not too much again the
7:06 water sample should turn just a little
7:08 bit cloudy um or you can add also some
7:11 dry yeast
7:12 piramisia also like to eat those and
7:14 when you wait a few days
7:16 then the water should clear up again and
7:19 this means that the milk and or the
7:21 yeast has been eaten up by the paramecia
7:23 and also the number of pyremicia has now
7:25 increased
7:27 tip number six over time the water does
7:29 evaporate of course do not use
7:31 chlorinated water when replenishing the
7:34 water ideally you're going to use again
7:36 pond water from the same place where you
7:38 collected the original water sample from
7:40 but you can use tap water
7:42 and if there is chlorine in the water
7:45 let the water stand for a few days to
7:47 allow the chlorine to escape
7:49 and if you do not have uh yeah water
7:52 available then you can of course
7:54 dechlorinated water available then of
7:56 course you can also use bottled water
7:58 this also works
7:59 tip number seven yes do clean your tools
8:03 there are bacteria of course on your
8:04 tools and you want to make sure that
8:06 everything is clean also for health
8:07 reasons
8:09 tip number eight um
8:11 the pyramid city like to move around
8:13 quite quickly and if you use only a very
8:16 small amount of water
8:18 then
8:19 this will limit the movement the
8:21 pyramicia then going to be sandwiched
8:22 between the cover glass and the glass
8:24 slide and the microscope slide and this
8:26 limits the movement to the extent
8:29 that they really slow down a lot and
8:31 you're able to observe them much better
8:33 tip number nine
8:35 yes
8:36 there are different parts in a jar the
8:39 bottom part the top part there with your
8:41 algae there where you there's the food
8:44 do it put different parts of this
8:47 water sample under the microscope
8:49 and you're going to see that in
8:51 different parts of the same jar
8:53 different microorganisms might
8:55 accumulate so for example
8:57 those microorganisms that need a lot of
8:59 oxygen can be probably found around the
9:01 algae and also at the surface of the
9:03 water because the oxygen concentration
9:06 is highest there and i've also seen
9:08 other microorganisms gather around the
9:10 food more yes you simply have to
9:12 experiment around a little bit and
9:15 you're going to be quite surprised um
9:17 which microorganisms you're going to be
9:19 able to find
9:21 and tip number 10 if everything fails if
9:23 nothing works well
9:25 yes you can always buy pyramicia online
9:28 from educational supplies companies uh
9:30 or even aquarium shops that sell them as
9:33 a source of food for fish um yeah and
9:36 that's pretty easy to do but i would say
9:38 it's much more interesting to experiment
9:40 around yourself a little bit and to
9:42 enrich them yourself
9:44 i think i'm just gonna leave it at that
9:45 right now do leave comments behind try
9:48 it out yourself and share your success
9:50 or your failures even
9:52 with the community that's why we have a
9:54 comment section below
9:56 i wish you all the best
9:58 happy micro punting as always and see
10:00 you around next time
10:02 bye
10:16 [Music]
10:21 you
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