Half-dry Flaming Katy
Nov 08, 2020 • 1:58 AM UTC
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hanaj
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I was never known for having the greenest thumb, and my track record of killing house plants probably doesn’t help with that. However, being stuck inside my room all day with no other living organism in sight has made me once again want to give houseplants a try. A month ago, I got a flaming katy plant ( Kalanchoe blossfeldiana ) as a present. The plant was doing fine the first couple of weeks, but recently the flowers and leaves have been looking drier than usual. My previous mistake with succulents have been overwatering, so I was extra careful to only water as necessary this time, and allow the top soil to completely dry before watering the plant again. However, I fear that I may now be overcompensating for past mistakes and be actually under-watering the plant, as only half of the flowers are blooming.
Flaming Katy flowers Since the theme of our class this semester is “Ecology is Everywhere,” I thought it was only fair that I take a closer look at the environment that I spend 95% of my time in. When I received the foldscope, I knew I wanted to take a microscopic look at my plant-friend-who-is-not-doing-so-well-these-days.
I was curious about the difference between the flower petals under the foldscope. Since there is an obvious pink pigment to the petals, how will that look magnified? What part of the plant cell does the pink come from? When comparing the dried flowers with the fully bloomed flowers, how will they look differently?
I was curious about the difference between the flower petals under the foldscope. Since there is an obvious pink pigment to the petals, how will that look magnified? What part of the plant cell does the pink come from? When comparing the dried flowers with the fully bloomed flowers, how will they look differently?
Fully bloomed petal Looking at the cells of the fully bloomed petal, I was surprised to see that it looks more green than pink under the foldscope, even though there doesn’t seem to be any green at all when looking at the petals through the naked eye. It’s fascinating to see the little green dots within each cell that are likely to be the chlorophylls. The outskirts of the field of view are also more pink than the cells in focus, but when I moved the slide around and tried to find areas where there could be potentially more pink, I couldn’t find any. I wonder if the lack of focus from the foldscope is what allows the pink to pop out against the green.
Dried petal The image of the dried petal is drastically different than that of the fully bloomed petal. In the dried petal, the cells aren’t visually differentiable from each other. All of the colors that was previously seen is gone as well. It’s interesting how drastic the difference is with just water removed. Seeing this difference, it has definitely motivated me to step up my plant caring game and hopefully prevent the rest of the flowers from drying out prematurely.
I conducted this project as part of Professor Pringle’s EEB321 class at Princeton University.
I conducted this project as part of Professor Pringle’s EEB321 class at Princeton University.
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