#algae tree

[greenfutures]

The ‘liquid tree’ is a photosynthetic bioreactor containing algae that converts CO2 to oxygen. Developed by scientists in Serbia, it “contains six hundred litres of water and works by using microalgae to bind carbon dioxide and produce pure oxygen through photosynthesis.”

It requires little maintenance, and the used biomass can be used as fertilizer.

Incorporated into benches with phone charging ports and a solar panel to light it up at night, the prototype algae kiosk is aimed to complement trees in urban areas where trees will take a longer time to grow; it’s also more 10 to 50 times more efficient at binding CO2.

[expressions-of-nature]

Mystic Pond by Ralf Mooss

[minacht]

[thesciencegeek]

Meme of the day!

Meme of the day!

Want some oxygen, but it's too expensive? Buy a mini scuba tank by clicking this amazon link!

[webdiggerxxx]

꧁★꧂

[nostalgicfun]

This is probably Too Niche, but to the vivid dreamers out there: do you ever get nostalgic for a place from your dreams that isn't real? I have recurring locations in my dreams that just. don't exist. And I find myself thinking about them or having "memories" about them even though they don't exist and never have. But they're real in my heart even though I'll never go there.

(tell me about these places in the tags, I'm so curious)

[lichenaday]

Lepraria jackii 

Lichen or mold? With just a casual glance, Lepraria lichens can look like mold to the untrained eye, so here is your training! Firstly, mold doesn't typically grow on healthy trees. So if you see a smear of white or green on an otherwise healthy looking tree, it is likely not mold. Secondly, if you get close, you will notice that Lepraria lichens like L. jackii are made up of fine or coarse well-delimited granules, often forming soft, random masses. Molds are typically minutely filamentous, often so small and dense that they kinda just blur together. So well delimited grains=lichens. Thirdly, lichens are a lot tougher than mold. Poke L. jackii and you will get some solid granules are your fingers, but the general structure will hold. Poke a mold, it'll fall apart and scrape right off the surface. Lastly, Leprarias and other lichens with green algal photobionts will appear darker green when moist due to the activation of their chlorophyl. Mold doesn't have chlorophyl, and so won't appear more green when moistened. So yeah, you don't have to worry if you see stuff like L. jackii on trees. Unlike molds which are saprotrophs (eat dead stuff), lichens are enclosed autotrophic systems (the photobiont makes food for itself and mycobiont) so they aren't consuming the tree or causing it any harm. In fact lichens are often an indicator of a healthy ecosystem! Hooray lichens!

images: source | source | source | source

info: source

[lionfloss]

today:)

[urmothersdrawers]

Im want to be a goat very badly

[mbhfphotos]

Lichen

Western Washington, March 1 2023 Photos Mary Howerton (shop)

[minacht]

[cedar-glade]

  Trentepohlia umbrina, high up in the Mt. airy valley black walnut, Cincinnati, Ohio.

I see three pretty common lichens on this tree but I was not actually trying to photograph any of these despite getting some good shots of one Lecanora hybocarpa complex lichen. aka bumpy rim lichen. Which I actually wanted to use as scale for the size of what I really wanted to take pics of.

Instead I was trying to photograph this beautiful red streak because I feel like often it is over looked and under appreciated from a botanical and mycological perspective, often even assumed to be part of woody material on red oaks as cork or lenticil tissue.

There is a niche group of semi complex crack species and exposed surface species of filimentous algae, actinomycetes, and cyanobacteria that make up a good portion of tree bark biota that we don’t often get taught about despite many of them being directly associated as a functional group(photobiont) of many lichen species. In this case, subaerial algae is the noted or deamed group type, this one on Black Walnut bark high up in the canopy is a filimentous chlorophyte...

 https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Examples-of-subaerial-habitats-and-algae-on-and-in-plants-A-Thin-film-of-green-algae_fig15_280577788

specifically the carotenoid rich Trentepohlia spp., Most species of Trentepohlia species are generalistic, even pollip clustering or forming long elongated hairs that are free standing and grow on rocks and trees freely depending on moisture and mineral contents. Some are directly associated with parasitism or within’ lichen as a mutualist coevolved as photobiont. 

Most species are pretty dang hard to Identify, resulting in utilizing microscopy or sequencing in order to resolve a taxa delineation.

Here, pictured above, is a very small species of bark dwelling caespitose (mat forming) relatively as prostrate as possible( growing non erect and almost adhering to the surface.) The good ol’ fashion algae is easy to get a sample of and put under a scope free floating in water, once done look at the filimentous grouping, linear psuedoseptae with elongated cells in conjunction with the roles of plasmodesmata for cytoplasmic streaming is not what I saw, instead I got adjacent rounded blobs forming the filamentous line with most of the pigment filing the cells. So matted dark red tree balls is what I viewed, Trentepohilia umbrina. The interesting thing is that this species is very small and while preferring exposure/barren niche like many Trentepohilia spp. do; we see this species in shaded cracks and crevices more than in zones of full exposure. Hence why umbrina may have been selected as epithet. ( within the shadows)

The most common species and easiest to ID are:

Trentepohlia abietina ( a small polip cluster forming tree only species) often associated with elongated cell structure. (https://www.jstor.org/stable/44841106)

Trentepohlia aurea Orange rock hair (the only species with an english common name that I am aware of) most of the other species only seem to have dutch, norwegian , russian, siberian, or native american first nation (inuit, metis, Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh) names. This species is huge and easy to see the hairy polip clusters.

Trentepohlia jolithus , a true nordic and beringian species limited to high volcanic regions in the northern hemisphere and very bright and prostrate forming dense mats on rocks appearing as a film

  Trentepohlia umbrina , or as I call it, matted on bark dark red tree balls clustered as a filamentous line, https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/410587-Trentepohlia-umbrina/browse_photos  This is what you see under obs scope, If you

Other common species but with no accessibility as far as ID delineation are these:

Trentepohlia flava , a coastal salt mist generalist species often found along the western coast of North America on rocks but also commonly found in europe near sea side areas in the north, while this doesn’t fully explain it’s locality niche or fix any range maps because we really don’t know if it has a cosmopolitain range or not and already a var. complex has formed along with range divisions.

https://www.proquest.com/openview/7f3a8e73a75fb8212470443aa189452c/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=37953.

The rest of these species in the genus are very inaccessible without ITIS or a lab to access.

[coridallasmultipass]

It took me, ugh, MONTHS (2), to get to cleaning the two shrimp tanks I have... I had IRL issues going on that would have made it extremely difficult to do a water change especially while injured, and I just had to keep putting it off. It's just shrimp, so it wasn't like, the worst situation, especially since I have established plants and the tanks are a couple years old. There was just a lot of algae build-up on the glass, and, well... Let me just say it was not contributing to my mental health and well-being while the tanks were in that state.

I tested the water before I started cleaning and the parameters were fine (like, I could have left the tanks even longer if I would be okay with selling my soul to the Algae Collective), and the plants and shrimp look fine, too (I mean, I've obviously been keeping an eye on the tanks bc I sit right next to them). Actually, I'd wager to say that the plants are looking really great (the lilies haven't died off [yet? This is the longest period of time I've seen them stay... foliage... fol... foliated? Idk.] and the cryptocoryne in the 10gal is fucking huge and needs to be rearranged, just not right now). That fucking algae was a motherfucker to get off the 10gal (it's a plastic tank and I think that makes the algae grip harder than the glass 5gal).

[Also, fyi, depending on the tank's needs and stability, recommended water changes are a small one every week or every other week. My parameters don't seem to do anything dramatic, so I usually aim for a 20-30% water change every third week (just depends on how much vacuuming needs to be done and how cooperative the shrimp are with moving aside). So 2 months is still a lot. I still did the normal 30% ish amount, since doing more will risk the shrimp's well-being if there's a sudden change in everything, and my water parameters indicated a change was unnecessary - but I don't test for more than the minimum freshwater tests, so there could be a buildup of some mineral I'm not testing for, which is why the change IS actually necessary regardless of what my test kit says - because these tanks were evaporating a lot in summer, it condenses the minerals added with each water addition, even tho I usually top up with R.O. water.]

My back is fucking killing me lol. It has been killing me since spring when it 'went out' for the first time, and I'm not getting any relief, it sucks. But this had to be done.

The 5gal is looking pretty cloudy still, since the filter was super gunked up and I accidentally spilled gunk back in, so I may need to retest the 5gal parameters tomorrow just to make sure I don't have to do another water change, but it'll probably be fine, right? Shrimp love mulm and detritus. I did give both tanks a big ole algae tab for their trouble, tho. (I need a fuckening dish for the big tank. I really wanna clean off that white quartz rock again, but being white means it's an algae magnet, and it's just gonna go green again after a month or two.)

Anyway, shrimp tax:

I lov thees widdle oange bebies.

Wish I could take better pictures rn, but I am. Like. Dying. My recommendation: never live in an A-frame style room if you have the option. The wall above my tanks is slanted, and NOT fun for my back to bend underneath the wall for maintenance. (My only flat wall in the room is for my TV/PC.) Also, treat your back nicely, in general. I unfortunately have not had the option to treat my back nicely since spring (fall now), because 'when it rains it pours,' and heavy shit that needs to be moved will not move itself. Once I get a few more things in my room in order, I will hopefully be done with the IRL chaos, bc I have Halloween socks to knit, and I'm not putting that off for another year. (I'm still mad that I couldn't make the ones I planned last year. And I found more Halloween yarn I forgot I bought, so I'm gonna try to make multiple socks.) And I just really need to fucking chill and knit and stop having panic attacks and meltdowns.

[elastica1995]

reading house of leaves

[paulpingminho]