Staining my Sculpin

One of our ichthyology assignments was to clear and stain a fish. I chose the sculpin that I drew from our first lab assignment.

I started to clear the fish about 6 weeks ago, it wasn't until last week when I could see the bones in the fish. I started off by soaking the fish in water for about an hour. I then stuck the fish in a solution of hydrogen oxide, tripsin and sodium bromide. I changed the solution every day but the fish still wasn't turning clear enough to the point where I was able to see the bones. After about 4 weeks of trying to clear the fish, I decided to poke some holes into the skin of the sculpin to try to make the process faster. At the end of week 5, I was able to see the bones inside the fish!

After that I placed the fish in some red dye with KOH. Every 5 hours I would change the solution for that until the sculpin itself (the bone part) was dyed. The fins turned out very well, however the rest of the body is still a little purple so I'm hoping the dye will come off! But so far so good!

Posted on November 28, 2012 03:00 AM by huangt3