My new huge discovery! So as I explained, I put the pistils in the Aniline Blue solution over the weekend, so today I was able to examine the entire pistil through the microscope. The pistils to my Canavalia sp. from Zwai are extremely huge! They're at least 3 centimeters long! Because of this, I couldn't use the normal cover slips. I had to use one twice the size of a normal cover slip! Now it was time to put the pistils (carefully because they're extremely fragile from the softening solution I soaked it in earlier) onto the slides and place the cover slip on top! The pistils are so large though, I had to press down on the cover slip in order to flatten the cover slip down so it lied flat on the slide. I did that, but I still wasn't able to see the ovules inside the pistil, so I had to flatten down the cover slip even more! I used a heavy microscope plate so I didn't get my fingerprints onto the cover slip. I didn't think I was pushing very hard on one of the slides, but apparently I did... I heard a small "pop!" and immediately picked up the microscope plate to see what had happened! I was expecting to find the slide broken or something! Instead I found this large yellow glob near the stigma! I had no idea what that was because looking at the pistil under the microscope before, I didn't see anything. Now, this light yellow glob was there! It popped right out of the pistil!
I decided to observe this under the microscope to find out what it was! Under the UV light (the light setting used to see the fluoresced pollen) the huge clump was a huge glowing mass! It was amazing to see! It didn't look like the pollen I've been observing though, so I wasn't sure if it was pollen or not. I decided to go ask Dr. Jean about it and see what she thought it was. She followed me back into the herbarium to observe it! First, she looked at the stigma just to see if she could find any pollen because I told her I thought I saw a few grains, but they were extremely small, so maybe it wasn't pollen at all and just a different structure that fluoresced. When Dr. Jean looked at it, she said it looked to be pollen but was difficult to tell and wasn't for certain either. After a little bit more time looking at it, she declared it wasn't pollen. She loved the look of the stigma though! It was full of hairs so so different from what she's seen before! She kept saying, "How beautiful! Look at that! It is just so beautiful!" It's difficult to see the insides of this pistil because it's so large, thick, and hairy. Despite that, Dr. Jean then looked at the large clump. At first she was positive it was pollen! So much of it! After looking at it, we found a few oval-beanlike figures (what made up the huge clump) that contained a nucleus and other structures in cells! It was so neat to see the inside of a cell under a microscope! I've only seen pictures of cells, so to see one in real life under a microscope was beyond amazing! Out of the hundreds of thousands of oval-beanlike figures there were, only a few were found to be developed with a nucleus. All the other ones didn't contain anything. This means that whatever they are, they are underdeveloped.
I didn't have time today to do research about what these figures are, so that's what I'm going to do tomorrow. Dr. Jean also had Yeshe look through the microscope to see what she thought this huge mass was, but she had no idea either. For something to compare to, Yeshe and I dissected a few flowers of samples I had taken of the Canavalia sp. in Zwai to see what the pollen looked like. One problem: I dissected 10 different flowers and didn't find pollen on any of the anthers. This means that all of those are sterile. If all 10 of those flowers are sterile, that means that many more flowers are sterile also. Does that mean all of the flowers growing on the plant are? Possibly, but I swear that when I first dissected them I saw pollen. I even germinated the pollen a few weeks ago, and could have sworn I found pollen on the slides even though they didn't germinate. Maybe I was wrong though. Maybe it wasn't pollen at all and instead, just a different structure that I mistook as pollen grains. Eseba and Ricardo are stopping at Zwai on Wednesday on their way home from Sodo, so they will gather more samples of the Canavalia sp. flowers for me to dissect and probably stain again. Then I'll see if all of the flowers really are sterile or just some are. It'll be interesting! My next few days will be jam-packed with research, research, and more research! (After Andreas does his seminar tomorrow)
Now the difficult factor! This morning, Dr. Jean told me that there is also a Canavalia sp. with the accession number 1251 growing in the greenhouse as well. So now there's more issues with this plant! It's growing in Zwai, Sodo, AND the greenhouse! It's growing and producing just fine in Sodo. It's flowering but not producing seed in Zwai, and neither flowering nor producing in the greenhouse. (Or at least I'm pretty sure it's not flowering. When she took me in there just now to show it to me there was no sign of any flowers.) Isn't this just super? I now have no idea what to do. I haven't done anything with this plant in the greenhosue and I have no clue as to what to do with it. I've tested the pollen and hand pollinated the one growing in Zwai. It's just extremely complicated to do research when the species is unknown. That makes my literature extremely broad. There's 40-some species in the Canavalia genus. I know I'll figure something out, but it's definitely going to take a lot of work now. Wish me luck! I'll probably need it!
Holy moly that was a long, busy, interesting, action-packed, question-filled, and knowledge-gained day! Now for some food pictures!
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| My injera lunch today! |
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| Our homemade dinner last night! |
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