Meade 900X instruction manual Preparing a Mount, Creating Smears

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Further Experiments: Try out the above proce- dure with other salts such as Epsom and Rochelle. Sugar will also crystallize, but you will need to let it dry overnight for the crystals to form.

Preparing a Mount

Dip your spatula (C, Fig. 1) in some clean water and make a smear across a clean slide. Use your tweezers (A, Fig. 1) to place a portion of an insect—a wing, a leg, or an antenna—on the slide. Attach a cover slip (I, Fig. 1) over the spec- imen and place the slide on the microscope stage.

Obtain a piece of hair from your head or from your pet and place it on a wet slide. Try this again with more than one type of hair on a slide and compare how they differ. Also try a piece of fern (or other plant) and pollen and compare them as well.

To save your slides, put gum media on a clean dry slide and then position your specimen in the media. Place a cover slip over the media and attach a label.

Creating Smears

Using your scalpel (B, Fig. 1), gently scrape off small shavings from the surface of a freshly cut potato.

Smear the shavings onto a clean slide (see Figs. 6 and 7). Clean the scalpel by swishing it in the flush water. Draw up some water using your eye- dropper from the cup labeled clean and put one drop onto the slide. Attach a cover slip to the

Fig. 6 Fig. 7