Week #12 Oh my RHI, why oh why must you treat me sow?

After finding alleged rhizobium sp. colonies in Hairy Vetch, Red Clover, and Black-Eyed Pea plants last week, I attempted to transfer one of each to a new dish; in an effort to isolate a pure colony. Obtaining colonies was an excellent result but I did see some contamination and although normal, it did warrant the transfer.I cannot believe that upon transferring the rhizobium sp. into new plates, that the bacteria overgrew once again. Nevertheless, the show must go on; so, today I decided to move forward and use the four strains I have obtained.

The next step is to take the four rhizobium sp. isolates and test them against antibiotics.I am testing the bacteria against antibiotics to determine if I have isolated different strains or not. Different strains of rhizobium sp. possess varying levels of resistance to a range of antibiotics. By comparing the zones of inhibition of the four strains I have isolated, I will be able to determine if the strains are of the same species. 

With four contenders (bacteria) and eight defenders (antibiotics), today the match was made. I am testing the aforementioned strains against ampicillin, penicillin, streptomycin, erthromycin, rifampin, ciprofloxacin, nalidixic acid, and sulfisoxazole.

Since my isolates have had a history of growing so fast, I am actually waiting until 1700 to put the Petri dishes in the incubator and then Matt will take them out tomorrow at 0800. I was going to leave them at room temperature but if I don't see any results tomorrow, the weekend would destroy any hopes of not seeing overgrowth. I cannot repeat the test next week because the Thanksgiving holiday would put me in the same scenario.

Why oh why??? Is there anyone else confused here besides me?

 1. THE CONTENDERS

 

 2. THE DEFENDERS