Optional Tools
When handling dead organisms, delicate structures, or even just some gross object you don’t want to touch, it might be in your best interests to invest in some tools in order to avoid any dirty situations you might face.
Tweezers
​By far, the tools that I use the most out of any optional tool are two small stainless steel tweezers. Tweezers are useful when picking up and transporting specimens from the outside world in, especially for things that probably shouldn’t be picked up by bare hands (for example, a dead bee). Tweezers are also fairly good at dissection (separating different parts of a flower, stripping a wing from an insect corpse, and more). It’s generally good practice to avoid directly touching things you intend to make into a microscope slide, both for sanitary reasons and because the specimen itself could get damaged, so a pair of tweezers should be your go to tool to avoid direct contact.
Petri Dishes
When collecting outside or storing specimens for future use, you might want to consider getting a few petri dishes. Petri dishes are actually used by scientists to grow bacteria or other small organisms, but it’s still useful for our purposes. Petri dishes are easy to move around while capable of storing many specimens that you might find. They are generally large enough to store even larger insects while small enough that you can quite easily take out anything you put inside of it. However, since petri dishes are so light, they might get blown away by the wind. If you bring petri dishes outside with you, you should be cautious of even small breezes.
Pipettes
For all things liquid, pipettes are the tools for the job. These are essential for wet slides and are very good at transporting small amounts of liquid. It’s main use is for wet slides, so to learn more about them, click here.