Connected on 2013-01-15 08:00:00 from Herkimer, New York, United States
- 7:15am
- Bugscope Team coating the sample now...
- 7:24am
- Bugscope Team pumping down
- 7:31am
- Bugscope Team now aligning, then we'll start making presets for today's session
- 7:36am
- 7:42am
- 7:47am
- Bugscope Team good morning, Mrs G!
- Student Hi there
- Bugscope Team I gave you control but if you can hold off for a few minutes I will make a few more presets
- Student Thanks, how does the specimen look? Did it dry well?
Bugscope Team it looks good. it is one of the presets you can see on the lefthand screen
- Bugscope Team this is its head, and to the right you see some of the stones it had assembled to protect it
- Student Nice view point
- Bugscope Team if it's alright with you I will make a few more presets before we get started. are the students there?
- 7:52am
- Student sounds good, students will be coming in a few minutes
Bugscope Team super cool
- 7:57am
- 8:02am
- Bugscope Team I think we have enough presets to get started
- Bugscope Team I will be right back...
- Bugscope Team we are ready to roll.
- Bugscope Team good morning, Everyone!
- Bugscope Team welcome to Bugscope!
- Bugscope Team please let us know when you have questions!
- Student Thank you, we are all set
- Bugscope Team Mrs G you may drive anytime you wish
- Bugscope Team we put the caddisfly larva on the stub but of course added a few other insects; you never know how a particular specimen will look at high mag
- Bugscope Team but the caddisfly larva looks pretty cool
- Bugscope Team please let us know if you would like us to give any of the students control of the microscope
- Bugscope Team this is the head of the caddisfly larva
- 8:08am
- Bugscope Team because they live in the water -- they are indicators of water quality, and will not live where the water quality is not good -- they are covered with water creatures, including diatoms
- Bugscope Team you have the ability to change the magnification, change focus, contrast/brightness, and also move around on the stub using click to center
- Student what is the dried plant?
Bugscope Team Cate made the sample last night, and I don't know where she got it.
- Student where are the eyes on this caddisfly larva
Bugscope Team I believe we can see one very small eye now, center left and a tiny bit north
- Student what are the fuctions on the tiny hairs
Bugscope Team there are multiple functions of the hairs, which we call setae: they are mechanosensory, chemosensory, and thermosensory, among other things
- Student what does the caddisfly feed on
Bugscope Team it is a predator and eats other creatures in the water
- Student hey ScotT where is its mouth?
Bugscope Team it is to the upper right
- Student what do they use their claw for?
Bugscope Team they use their claws the same way we use our hands, in many ways; but they have six claws/'hands'
- Bugscope Team this is the mouth
- Student How long does the caddisfly usually live for
Bugscope Team I think just a few weeks; we'll have to confirm that...
- 8:14am
- Student what is a diaton?
Bugscope Team diatoms are single-celled silica-shelled creatures that swim in the water; they come in all shapes
- Student what are the bumps on its back
Bugscope Team it is lying on its back now, and the bumps we see are stones it has assembled to protect it
- Student how big do these usually get to be
Bugscope Team I believe they can get to be nearly 2 inches long
- Bugscope Team see the stones?
- Bugscope Team this is pretty cool
- Bugscope Team if you take the magnification up you can see the surfaces of the stones, and there you will find diatoms
- Student when they are getting the stones do they have a hard time moving them
- Bugscope Team Mrs G is it alright if I give the students control?
- Student where do they live
Bugscope Team they live in clear streams, in fresh water
- Student that's fine
- Student how long do they use one case for?
Bugscope Team it is kind of like a pre-cocoon for them, so it is long enough for them to eat and grow, get ready to become caddisflies
- Student how do they breathe
Bugscope Team when they are larvae, like this, they have something like gills that help them collect oxygen from the water
- Bugscope Team Stephen and Casey I gave you control.
- 8:19am
- Bugscope Team there are 12,000 species of caddisflies, so of course they are not all exactly the same
- Student lucky them
Bugscope Team haha
- Bugscope Team this is a small female spider
- Student are those teeth
Bugscope Team they are fangs, as close to teeth as arthropods get; they are likely considered to be mandibles (jaws)
- Bugscope Team it is cool that we can see the venom pore on the fang we see best here
- Student kind
- Bugscope Team the thick things the fangs are attached to are the chelicers, or chelicerae, which open so the fangs can be spread apart and the spider can bite
- Student what kind of spiter is this
- Student what is the hair on it for
Bugscope Team the hair, like that on insects, is sensory; in a spider much of it is vibration sensory
- Student what find of spider is it
Bugscope Team I am not sure; it is some kind of house spider
- Student how much more venom does a male spider have than a female?
Bugscope Team probably less, generally, since male spiders are often smaller
- Student can we have control of the million dollar microscope please? :)
Bugscope Team yes!
- Bugscope Team Nill you are the Supreme Ruler
- 8:25am
- Bugscope Team let me know if you have any trouble driving
- Bugscope Team when I am sitting at the microscope itself, I am SEM (scanning electron microscope)
- Student is a daddy long leg a spider?
Bugscope Team I believe it is in a larger family of spiders, but it is really quite different
- Student how long does it take to learn all this info about these insects?
Bugscope Team we have been doing this for almost 14 years, and we are always going to be learning. we ask the entomologists lots of questions.
- Bugscope Team we can see that the cricket has two compound eyes, on either side of its head; what is cool is that this one also has an eye in the middle of its head, between the antennae
- Student dose it have teeth?
Bugscope Team it has mandibles, which may have hardened tips, kind of like teeth. no insect or similar arthropod has what are considered true teeth
- Student the things around the mouth are they used like arms
Bugscope Team they are palps, and yes they are -- they accessory mouthparts, almost like eating utensils that also help the insect taste its food
- 8:31am
- Student what is the structure of the spider
Bugscope Team spiders have a cephalothorax -- a 'head-trunk' or 'head-chest' as one piece, with the eight legs attached to it as well as the abdomen
- Student what are those pipe like structures on the back of the head?
Bugscope Team those are the antennae
- Student when a cricket is born is it able to move or is it in a larva form?
Bugscope Team I believe they are born as tiny crickets, but I am not sure
- Student how many antennae do they have
- Bugscope Team all insects have two antennae; that is one reason we know lobsters are not insects -- they have two sets of antennae
- Student we are in the process of making a sketch
Bugscope Team you will have access to these images later, from your member page. so if you would like, ask the students to try all of the presets, at least, so you have a record of them\
- Student what are the function of the antennae?
Bugscope Team they help the insect sense the world through chemosensing, and touch; in some ways and in some insects they are more important than eyes\
- Student Does the third eye help provide a more complete view of its surroundings?
Bugscope Team it is likely there are two more eyes like that that we cannot see; they are called ocelli, and they sense light -- they do not work as well as compound eyes; they are good for helping an insect locate itsef in the environment in relation to the sun, for example; flying insects often have ocelli on the tops of their heads
- 8:36am
- Bugscope Team does someone else want to drive?
- Bugscope Team ants use their antennae to collect minute traces of chemicals, or you could say smells
- Student us
Bugscope Team got it!
- Bugscope Team ants lay down and follow chemical trails, and they follow the stronger trails more than the weaker trails, generally, in search of food
- Bugscope Team this is really cool
- Bugscope Team the venom pore is clogged with something, perhaps crystallized venom
- Bugscope Team spiders feed by injecting venom into their prey that dissolve the inner organs of the prey; they then suck all of that up like a milkshake
- Bugscope Team you can see lots of what are called plumose setae near the fang
- Bugscope Team spiders have those pine tree like setae quite often
- 8:42am
- Bugscope Team some spiders, like tarantulas, also have what are called urticating hairs. urticaria is itching. when a dog, for example, comes up and sniffs a tarantula, it releases some of those hairs, which get into the dog's nostrils and discourages it from bothering the spider
- Student is it true when an ant is in danger it sets off a pheramone so the other ants know it is need of help?
Bugscope Team yes it is!
- Student Why do they have that particular structure?
Bugscope Team we think the plumose setae are more sensitive to vibration
- Bugscope Team if you rubbed the smell of dead ants on a live ant, the ants that normally do the cleanup will carry the live ant away, even if it is clearly alive and struggling, because of the scent of death on it
- Student Is the pore it self tords the tip
Bugscope Team yes it is!
- Student can we have control
Bugscope Team you are the bosses now!
- Bugscope Team there is a pore like that on each fang, but we cannot see it on the other fang right now
- Bugscope Team the other fang is to the left and below
- Bugscope Team this is a housefly, and it is a female
- Bugscope Team in many flies, the eyes of the males are close together, and the eyes of the females are far apart. like Mikhail Baryshnikov and Uma Thurman.
- Student how many eyes?
Bugscope Team there are a few thousand ommatidia (facets of the compound eye) in each compound eye; there are also three ocelli (simple eyes) on top of the head
- 8:47am
- Bugscope Team some large wasps have as many as 17,000 ommatidia per compound eye
- Bugscope Team in the middle of where we are looking now, we see one of the spiracles
- Student how long can they live for?
Bugscope Team I think the average is about 6 weeks; often insects can live longer in captivity
- Student how do you tell if these insects are male or female?
Bugscope Team in this case we can tell by the eyes; sometimes there are other body features that help us; often we cannot tell from the outside, however
- Student We are going to wrap up
Bugscope Team ohhh.
- Bugscope Team Thank you for connecting with us today!
- Bugscope Team https://bugscope.beckman.illinois.edu/members/2012-110
- Bugscope Team below is your member page, where there is a transcript of this chat session and also many of the images you have collected
- Bugscope Team I will move to the other presets to save them for your member page.
- Bugscope Team Thank You!
- 8:52am
- Student Thank you so much for all the info
Bugscope Team You bet!
- Bugscope Team we enjoyed working with you!
- Bugscope Team if you would like to take more time to explore, please do. let me know when you have questions!
- 9:00am
- Bugscope Team caddisflies live for a year, usually, and in the adult form, as flies, they usually live for a few weeks but may live for 2 months
- Student Are the pictures from the session today download able?
Bugscope Team from the transcript, from the member page, you can click on an image and download it.
- Bugscope Team from this member page -- your page: https://bugscope.beckman.illinois.edu/members/2012-110
- Bugscope Team http://bugscope.beckman.illinois.edu/members/2012-110
- Student Thank you!
- Bugscope Team Thank you!
- Bugscope Team alright I am shutting down now...
- Bugscope Team Bye!
