Phylum Almost Cool's Ecosphere Final Blog Post

Hey guys,
Here's our final ecosphere post! Just wanted to give a little update on our Snail pad... We had a SNAILPLOSION!!! We very happy to announce Gary had many many many snail babies.

Gary (bottom left) with some snail babies

A closer look at the larger snails in the ecosphere

We wanted to compare an ecosphere that had a snail as well as most ingredients in common. Both of our ecospheres have water, minerals, gravel, soil, hay, mermaid plants (MCDC has one extra), and a snail. The differences in our ecosphere is that we included euglena, volvox, utricularia, and daphnia whereas MCDC included sand, pond water, & an aquatic floating fern. MCDC's ecosphere piqued our interest because their snail's reproduction quite different than ours.

Phylum Almost Cool’s Ecosphere	MCDC’s Ecosphere
Water Mineral Supplement Gravel Soil Hay Euglena Volvox Two Utricularia Plants Two Mermaid Plants One Snail Daphnia	Water Mineral Supplement Gravel Soil Hay Sand Pond water Aquatic Floating Fern Three Mermaid Plants One Snail

Snails like Gary (Ramshorn snail) can reproduce asexually very rapidly if there is an abundant source of food. Since snails eat mostly dead or decaying matter and algae, we believed our ecosphere supported Gary very well because we included good amount of hay as well as dead daphnia that were more than likely eaten by utricularia. In comparison, MCDC's ecosphere did not include as much hay or any other heterotrophs therefore provided their snail with a smaller selection of food sources. Another difference was our water, it seems lately our water is yellow and MCDC's is very clear. We hypothesize that the relocation of our ecosphere created a bloom of either volvox, euglena, and algae or a combination of them. We are curious to see what happens to our ecospheres now that both have baby snails. We hope that our ecosystem will not crash because of the overpopulation of snails. 

The Fun-Gis Final Ecosphere Post

After the death of Gary in our ecosystem, we weren’t expecting much excitement to happen. We had a lot of daphnias, and we looked forward to seeing how crowded our jar would get, but that was all the expectations that we had. However, something unexpected did happen.

And it. was. GLORIOUS.

The story is this: We were checking out our jar as normal, and not really expecting much of a change from the previous week. Then, BAM, Kateka slammed the jar into that little ledge on the window while putting it back. Commence the freak out! Luckily nothing broke, but due to that bump, something fell from our floating fern. At first we thought it was just a leaf, but upon closer observation, we realized it was a BABY SNAIL!

What???? Gary had died weeks ago!

Since the snail is fairly grown-up at this point, we came to a conclusion that Gary probably laid eggs before he died, and the eggs must have floated up to the top where it got stuck on the floating fern and leaves of the plants. The baby must have grown up there where it’s dark colors blended in with the plant making it hard for us to have seen it.

But wait, there’s more!

In the end, we counted 5 total baby snails. We discovered these snails on May 11th, and by the time May 16th rolled around, the algae growth on the side of our jar had cleared up completely, meaning the mini-Garys have been feeding quite a bit. Hopefully there is enough food to sustain them for awhile.

Now onto our comparison. We chose The Good Boy’s ecosystem because it was the most similar, yet they had different results from ours.

As mentioned, our daphnia growth was craazy, but Gary died prematurely. In The Good Boy’s ecosystem, the daphnia are nowhere to be found--however, they have lots of baby snails. We hypothesize that the mystery pond water had the needed algae and bacteria for daphnia to thrive. Meanwhile, DI water used in TGB’s ecosphere might have lacked an essential nutrient. Our ecosphere had also been filled with algae, unlike TGB’s ecosystem, which was very clean. But, at the growth of our baby snails, the tank was clean!

Aside from the resurrection of snails and cleaning of the tank, our ecosphere is very similar to how it was last. An additional and expected event was the continuous growth of our mermaid and bacopa plants.

BONUS:

Here’s Gary 2.0 mounting the dead shell of original Gary. Slightly creepy. Mostly cute.

Ecosphere Report

<Ecosphere Report By MCDC>

Group 4 (Dayeon Jung, Wenyi Fu , Mariam Elias, Conner Laursen)

On April 4th, 2016, our group set up a self-sustaining ecosystem in a jar in order to observe how the ecosphere works; we all hope our ecosphere jar will persist, grow and possibly even flourish throughout the whole quarter. Other group also did the same experiment, but they have different ingredients. Therefore, we have different results. This week, MCDC is going to compare our ecosphere jar with other groups. Before starting the experiment, our group carefully discussed what organisms that we would like to put in the ecosphere jar. During the experiment, we followed the procedure which  was provided by the instructor and recorded all the materials that were put into the ecosphere jar. Our group started with 3 mermaid (autotrophs) and we still have 3. We started with 1 snail and now have multiple snail offspring which can be seen crawling on the side of our ecosphere. We hope to observe, compare and contrast our ecosphere with others from our lab.

Figure 1:Ecosphere Jar Set-up On April 11, 13, 18

Our ecosphere jar was very cloudy and dark when we first sat it up. This is because soil was the last thing that we added. According to the materials, we added a lot of organisms into our ecosphere jar but we could not see them clearly. After one week, our ecosphere jar became clear and clear. We think this is because all the sediment and soil settled down.

on  April 4, the first day that the our class did the experiment, our jar was very cloudy and full of dirt floating around. Also, some groups jars were not as cloudy as ours but some of them were  more cloudy than ours but as time went on, our jar cleared up more and more until it was similar to the light color jars, but the darker jars just kept getting darker and more cloudy until now. Fortunately, we just realized that we have many snail offspring in our jar. This was something that we did not anticipate happening. We are still wondering how just one snail can produce baby snails but itself. Maybe it was already pregnant. We are still working on the answer.

Figure 5:Ecosphere Jar Partial view On April 25, May 2 and May 18

The snail is still alive and Mermaid and the aquatic floating fern keeps living. On that day, we compared our snail and other organisms with other group’s. The other group’s snail was dead already but ours was still alive and it was moving. We assumed that we put enough soil and peas for the snail to live. The dark and blurry water got cleaner and everything settled down.  

                      Snail from MCDC                 Snail from Other Group

                     Baby Snail from MCDC       Baby Snails from Other Group

Comparing with other group that also have snail. Our most notable observation of our group and other groups with a snail is that all of us have baby snails. For our group, we did not have babies snails until recently; however, baby snails showed up from other group shortly after.

Conclusion

All the organisms we put on the first day are still alive; even the snail. On the first day, our team thought we put too much soil and peas and we were worried the snail would be dead within few days. However, the water got cleaner and cleaner and the snail’s movement was pretty good. To breed living organisms was pretty interesting. Also, to observe it every week and to check what organisms prevailed and which passed away was amazing.

How do snails reproduce?

Some snails are considered to be hermaphrodites. This means that every snail will have both male and female reproductive organs (snail-world). Snails reproduce similarly to almost everything else does - they mate and lay eggs. Some snails are hermaphrodites, though (have both male and female sexual organs in the same individual), which means that two snails can fertilize each-other (scienceline). Work Cited “How Do Snails Reproduce?” Snail Facts and Information. Web. 18 May 2016. “UCSD Science Line.” UCSD Science Line. Web. 18 May 2016.

                                        Group Funguy                                   MCDC

Figure - Ecosphere from group Funguy

Materials : pond water, water & minerals, gravel, soil, sand

Autotrophs: Anabaena, Volvox, Selenastrum, Aquatic floating fern, Water sprite, Bacopa

Heterotrophs: snail

Description : The group FunGuy Ecosphere is kind of different from our Ecosphere, as they got Alga in their ecosphere and that's why it looks kinds of greenish. They also have a snail and its still alive but we aren’t sure if they have any baby snails or not. FunGuy group, let us know please.

                                      Group SALT                                          MCDC

Figure : Ecosphere from group SALT

Materials : pond water, water & minerals, gravel, soil, hay

Autotrophs : Anabaena, Selenastrum, Water sprite, Bacopa

Heterotrophs : Shrimp, Daphnia

Description : The group SALT’s ecosphere bottle looks fresh and clean. However, after few weeks since they made this ecosphere bottle, the shrimp died. For us, MCDC, we have a snail and it still lives today.

                                 Another Group                                           MCDC

Figure: Ecosphere from other group

Materials: water & minerals, gravel, soil

Autotrophs : Anabaena, Mermaid, Floating fern

Heterotrophs : Snail, Shrimp, Daphnia

Description : The shrimp is still alive. They have similar autotrophs to ours, but they only have one mermaid compared to our 3. They also have a similar floating fern, that is why they look alike.

Final Ecosphere Post! KKJT vs JESK

Out of all the ecospheres in our class our ecosphere was most similar to the group JESK. Below are the two ecospheres for comparison.

KKJT Ecosphere

JESK Ecosphere

KKJT & JESK Similarity Matrix

I figured the best way to display the similarities and differences in the least amount of text was to use an all too familiar similarity matrix! Our ecosphere contained anabaena, a mermaid plant, and the protist stentor - JESK's did not. JESK's ecosphere contained pond water and a bacopa plant where as ours did not.

SNAIL DEATH ):

In both of our ecospheres the snails died immediately, I would assume this is due to the fact that snails feed on algae and it took several days for algae to accumulate from what was probably already existing in the pond water. Our ecosphere however did not have any algae to feed on because we did not include pond water in our ecosphere. 

BABY SNAILS (:

Roughly three weeks proceeding the death of the mature snails, both of our ecosphere gave rise to baby snails! The snails must have laid their eggs before they died and the baby snails were able to survive off of the accumulating dead organic matter or algae. 

GHOST SHRIMP 

I had never seen a transparent shrimp until this ecosphere experiment, not surprisingly that is how they got their name! These ghost shrimp will eat almost anything which helps explain how they have been so well off in both ecospheres. Every time we checked up on our ecosphere the shrimp would constantly be picking through the detritus in the soil or feeding off dead plant matter. These shrimp are great pickers and eat like machines!

STENTOR

Our stentors did not survive in our ecosphere, so I did a little bit of research to figure out why. Interestingly stentors are stalked meaning they are most commonly found attached to the ground. Because these little guys do not move around much you would assume they are likely autotrophic, but they actually filter feel on bacteria and plankton, grabbing food as it flows by. Due to our ecospheres pond-like environment there was not any water flow for the stentors to grab food from, so perhaps the shrimp got to the anabaena first or perhaps the shrimp ate the stentors due to its very large appetite!

DAPHNIA

There did not appear to be any living daphnia in JESK's ecosphere and there definitely were not any surviving daphnia in our ecosphere. Not surprisingly I believe the shrimp ate all of them! The shrimp is definitely the Tyrannosaurus Rex of our ecospheres!

Fun Fact: Dogs do not like giant snails... especially my dog Koda (:

***EXCLUSIVE*** All Group Ecology Coverage ***EXCLUSIVE***

Hello reader! Have you ever wondered what exciting, fresh, science is happening at the lab station right next to you? Me too! That's why I did some quick investigative journalism last Wednesday to find out. Below you can check out a quick video over viewing what everyone is up to, which I thought might be good to know since everyone's pretty much absorbed into their own science at this point. I might ask everyone for quick updates in the weeks to come if they're okay with it, so watch out for how things progress~!

Groups in the 1120 Lab Section

Svetlana Alabyeva, Tyler Klaudt, Kevin Tang, Kateka Seth - Microbe interaction with Western Sword Ferns

Mariam Elias, Wenyi Fu, Dayeon Jung, Conner Laursen - Bee Rhododendron Flower Colour Preference

Jade, Karissa Crawford, Karissa Guzman, Thinh Pham - Investigation of Pond Water Quality using Daphnia as an Indicator Species 

Emma Brasseur, Shane Hall, Jessica Roth, and Karina Yu - Angiosperm Resistance to Toxicity of Nicotine and Petroleum

Vladimir Afanasenko, Nathaniel Cutshall, Gerar Suaverdez, Patrick Widjaja - Competition between Aphid Species on Pea Plants

*Taylor Jones, Amy Latimer, Lisa Merritt, Shawna Steele - Effect of Soil pH on Rate of Transpiration in Tomato Plants

Yasmin Dunn, Christopher Nguyen, Stacie Takushi, Jessica Ufland - Bee Flower Fragrance and Nectar Concentration Preference


*Technically these guys are in 1126 but they're in the video so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯


P.S. If I missed anyone out or I'm summarised something wrong, please feel free to let me know by email or comments, thanks!

Ecology Research Project by MCDC

Research Of The Interaction Between Rhododendron and Bees By MCDC

<WENYI FU, CONNER K LAURSEN, DAYEON JUNG, MARIAM G ELIAS>

The Rhododendron is the national flower of Nepal. Rhododendron macrophyllum, which is a species of Rhododendron and is designated as the state flower in Washington officially in 1959. If we pay more attention to the flowers around us, we can see that Rhododendrons are everywhere in Washington. To know the interactions between flowers and insects, our group made many observations of Rhododendrons from beds, parks, and our backyards.

Figure 1: The Photo Of Rhododendron Taken On The Roadside

Figure 2: The Pictures Of Rhododendron Taken At The Front Yard

We all got some different results, but only one thing in common, which is bees are more willing to pollen on the Rhododendron with purple color than other colors, such as pink, red and white.  According to this observation, we design to do research to determine whether Rhododendrons with purple color are more attractive to bees. Does this situation occur accidentally or does it depend on other conditions, such as the weather, temperature or even the color of the Rhododendron? As a result, our group comes up with a hypothesis; Rhododendron with purple color is more attractive than other colors. During the experiment, our group will do some research on Rhododendron, to know whether the color influences its attractiveness to bees, and our primary focus will be the interaction between the Rhododendron with purple, red, pink color and the bees; the overall design of the experiment is to observe bees as they fly around pollinating on Rhododendron with purple, red and pink color and count how many times they pollinate each color. At first, doing some observations on Rhododendron to know more about Rhododendron. The locations around various neighborhoods have already been scouted and confirmed to have a diverse color pallet of Rhododendron flowers. We plan to do the observation outside a lovely lady’s house (address: 13407 47th Pl W, Mukilteo, WA 98275), which has three different colors of Rhododendron. Next, we will observe Rhododendrons with the same three colors in 2 other locations; on campus here at Edmonds Community College and 19019 20th Pl W, Lynnwood, WA 98036.  For each location, we will run two trials of observation; once in the morning, and once in the afternoon because of the differences of bee activeness during the day. There are four groupmates in our group in total, so we will have an observation time in the morning and the other one in the afternoon; four groups will be separated and do the observation in pairs, one observes, and the other one record the information that might affect the attractiveness to the bee, such as the weather and the temperature. When all the groupmates meet in a lab on Monday or Wednesday, we have to compare our results and answer various questions. After that, we will be able to conclude whether a purple Rhododendron is the most attractive to bees based on the number of times a bee pollinates it.

On May 9, our group started to discuss our observation schedule and places. We got the places for observation to Conner’s neighbor's house, his mom’s place and School’s garden which is in front of Brier building of EDCC. His neighbor’s house is located in Mukilteo, and his mom’s place is located in Lynnwood.  Also, we take two different times for observations which are morning, around 10 a.m. and afternoon which is around 6:30 p.m. The weather and degree of the day were different from each week. From the second week of observations, the flowers have been fading and falling. We have observed three different colors which are purple, red and pink.

Observation Schedule for 13407 47th Pl W, Mukilteo, WA 98275, Edmonds Community College and 19019 20th Pl W, Lynnwood, WA 98036
	Morning	Afternoon
May 13, 2016	Done	Done
May 20, 2016	Done	Done
May 27, 2016	TBD	TBD

On May 13, 2016. We did our first observation. The weather was little bit sunny and windy. The flowers were getting fade and dry. It was 56 degree celsius outside in the morning, but 70 degree celsius in the afternoon. The most noticeable change from last week is the flower’s fading. Conner and Mariam(two of our groupmates) made three identically sized shoelace rings for limiting an individual area for the inspection of the Rhododendron plants. This is because we plan only to count the number of the bees in these consistent, specific areas.

Figure 3: The Specific Area For the Observation of Red Rhododendron

Figure 4:  Photo of Pink Rhododendron That We Observed

Let us show you the results from our observation!

May 13, 2016  - 13407 47th Pl W, Mukilteo, WA 98275
The Color of Rhododendron	Amount of the Bee that pollinate flowers at 10:15 a.m.	Amount of the Bee that pollinate flowers at 6:30 p.m.
Purple	66	57
Red	51	36
Pink	38	33

May 13, 2016  - 19019 20th Pl W, Lynnwood, WA 98036
The Color of Rhododendron	Amount of the Bee that pollinate flowers at 10:00 a.m.	Amount of the Bee that pollinate flowers at 6:30 p.m.
Purple	30	32
Red	24	28
Pink	19	22

May 13, 2016 - 19019 20th Pl W, Lynnwood, WA 98036 (Edmonds Community College)
The Color of Rhododendron	Amount of the Bee that pollinate flowers at 10:00 a.m.	Amount of the Bee that pollinate flowers at 6:30 p.m.
Purple	56	49
Red	38	37
Pink	32	27

On May 20, 2016, at 10 am in the morning we also did some new observation. It was 57oC (Cloudy and rainy weather). As time passing and the raining whether, the Rhododendron from the three locations are all withering. They do not as many as last week. Nevertheless, we still got some nice results. All the observation shows that the Rhododendron with purple color had more bees to pollinate on them; it is a good results for our hypothesis.  

May 20, 2016  - 13407 47th Pl W, Mukilteo, WA 98275
The Color of Rhododendron	Amount of the Bee that pollinate flowers at 10:00 a.m.	Amount of the Bee that pollinate flowers at 6:30 p.m.
Purple	11	17
Red	5	12
Pink	4	11

May 20, 2016  - 19019 20th Pl W, Lynnwood, WA 98036
The Color of Rhododendron	Amount of the Bee that pollinate flowers at 10:00 a.m.	Amount of the Bee that pollinate flowers at 6:30 p.m.
Purple	20	40
Red	29	26
Pink	10	3

May 20, 2016 - 19019 20th Pl W, Lynnwood, WA 98036 (Edmonds Community College)
The Color of Rhododendron	Amount of the Bee that pollinate flowers at 10:00 a.m.	Amount of the Bee that pollinate flowers at 7:30 p.m.
Purple	10	24
Red	4	9
Pink	6	4

After three weeks of observation and data collection, we have some research questions that we are going to focus before starting the report.

1. Why Rhododendron in purple color is more attractive to bees?

• Bees find blue, purple and yellow flowers most appealing.

2. Whether the weather and temperature affect our hypothesis.

• When the weather is cloudy and raining, the number of bees get decreasing.

3. Whether the life cycle of Rhododendron affect this experiment.
4. Do bees seek the Rhododendron with different colors depending on the taste of nectar?

• The color and flavor of honeys differ depending on the nectar source (the blossoms) visited by the honey bees. In fact, there are more than 300 unique types of honey available in the United States, each originating from a different floral source. So, it can be said honey determines the honey’s quality and taste.

Figure 5: Life Cycle of Rhododendron

Reference

"Attracting Beneficial Bees: Gardener's Supply." Gardeners Supply. Web. 21 May 2016.

"Honey." National Board. Web. 21 May 2016.

"Reproduction." Of Rhododendron Ponticum. Web. 21 May 2016.