Unidentified in the Creek
- rtinkes1
- Mar 30, 2021
- 2 min read
Bored, yearning for adventure, and curious, I decided to take a short walk to the local creek and see what was brewing in the gunk below. Put on some gloves, packed my backpack with specimen jars, snatched up my trusty dollar store "grabber-claw" and dunked all of it as deep into the muck as I could. I figured I had to corral some good microbes that way.
After my boot sliding into the muck and almost falling in, with only my son to save me from an inevitable over-reaction of germaphobia, I finally headed back home, created some wet slides, and started recording short videos on my microscope.
Little did I know I wouldn't be able to identify what I was about to see. Having used NO oil emersion it obviously wasn't bacteria, but I did see the typical diatoms in their oh-so abundant forms, along with the myriad of "muck life" I've seen before; algae, lots of tiny black specks feeding on the greenery, and a ton of nothing. Disappointing.
As I moved the slides around I finally came across a couple of exciting prospects. A seemingly rhythmic, heart-beat like... egg? Very strange. Is something feeding on it? What's inside of it? Is it attached to something? What is going on?! I LOVE IT! Finally something fascinating. Sure to have stumbled on a known microbe I could research and learn more about!
Oddly though, google was no help. I searched all the key words I possible could: rhythmic, egg, "that creek life, yo", anything. Perhaps it had a blog of it's own... but alas... there was nothing to come close to my descriptions.
I decided to get back to my microscope screen before all the water had dried up as the poor little microbes were dying. Ahh, yet again, something amazing! Keep in mind I was not using a high enough magnification (no oil emersion), so this was NOT bacteria. It does, however, look and move like a spirochaete bacteria, but it must be much bigger! I wish I had been more thorough and taken note of my magnification, among other details, in my random microbe seeking adventure. Lesson learned!
At this point, Google, Google Scholar, Ebscohost, Social Media... were absolutely no help in identifying these little guys. Frustrated and doubting my ability to do a simple internet search, I took my laptop to my university to ask the experts.
They were as fascinated as I was, but neither could identify these guys! They also searched tirelessly for any clues on the internet, helping to keep my ego intact, and then jokingly asked, "If you found a new species, could you name it after us?" Ha! I would absolutely, but I highly doubt these are anything newly discovered. While the world is vast and full of new, unidentified, and infinite possibilities... someone out there has to have a clue leading to the identification of these guys (or girls, or other!) It would be pretty cool if I've discovered something new, but in my excitement and having neglected to take note of some very important details, I suppose we'll never know.
Meanwhile, I hope you all enjoy the mystery as much as I.
As always, here for your curiosity.
XOXO
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