Example -- culture crash and bacterial bloom
Thursday, August 11, 2011 9:23 PM
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While not any of the species we will be working with this is still a good visual of what a nice solid culture crash looks like. This was a culture of Pseudodiaptomus that I brought back from the workshop... granted the copepods didnt make the first week on my return (too much stress from refridgeration and travel) I decided to let the culture bubble in an erlinmyer for a little while to see what cropped up. The culture was fed a mixture of Rhodomonas lens, Gymnodinium sp., Nannochloropsis, and Isochrysis paste. interestingly enough the Nanno held in for a little while there but during tonights nightly culture run I decided it was time to pull this guy off the shelf. Notice the milky white coloring to the water, this is very tell tale of a bacterial bloom. Naturally the bacteria left in this failed culture is feeding on the remains of what once was several dead copepods and many decaying algal cells. Normally it is not in my nature to let a culture go this far south before pulling it from the rack as having it near my other cultures increases the risk of cross contamination and thus multiple culture crashes, but truth be told I got lazy on this one. Turned out well though as I have some good pics to illustrate bacterial take over.
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