Soil tests

at: http://www.ehow.com/info_8562410_effects-biodegradable-waste.html Experiment: I wanted to test whether biodegradable packaging really is better for plants and the environment than other/no packaging or not, which is why I came up with an experiment to test this. Hypothesis: Plants that have biodegradable packaging in their soil will grow better than plants with other/no packaging in their soil. Aim: To prove that biodegradable packaging helps plants grow bigger than any other/no…

including landscape organization assessment (LOA) and soil surface assessment (SSA). Firstly, we set up a 50m transect running directly up and down the slope and mapped patches and interpatches on this transect. We regarded the place where resources could be accumulated as patches, like grass, shrubs, logs or trees. Then we made soil surface assessment by choosing 3 points in each patch type randomly and collecting 11 indicators which can reflect soil quality. Hillslope scale data could describe…

tomato hydroponic stand, one question plagued many of the team members ' minds. What is hydroponics? It is the technique of growing vegetation without soil. This process is rich in history and science, and is important to the Kansas farming industry. Though the word hydroponics is fairly new, different cultures have been growing plants without soil since ancient times. Dating back to the Aztecs, people were growing plants on a river. The Hanging Gardens of Babylon, one of the Seven Wonders…

Many gardeners may not be aware that common items from around the house can start off a healthy, nutritious garden. Composting is one of the ways to retain a well-maintained garden while avoiding chemical fertilizers. Using compost in your garden has been known to be beneficial in building a sustained garden due to its spectrum of essential plant nutrients. Using compost as a organic fertilizer is an important factor in maintaining a healthy garden because it is cost effective, convenient, saves…

The use of biochar on a widespread and large-scale has thus been shown to be greatly beneficial in the fight against climate change, as well as for sustainable soil management. But before this can be seriously implemented and developed into policy, scientific evidence must be expanded to fully cover implication of its use on soil properties, processes and functions (Verheijen et al 2012). Until this has been comprehensively quantified, regulations have a higher likelihood of unsuccessfully…

stemmed from a good place, the effects were detrimental. Inorganic materials added to the soil and plants polluted the soil and water systems in and around the fields. Water pollution exposed people and the environment downstream to the lethal chemicals being used in the farm fields. Pollution and tillage resulted in lower soil quality increasing topsoil erosion. Unintentional consequences in water use, soil deprivation, and chemical runoffs have had grave environmental impacts past of areas of…

P. putida and P. fluorescens isolates were cultured in 250 ml Laurea Broth (LB) medium at 30±1 ºC for 36 h in an incubator shaker at 150 rpm. The culture was then poured into 50 ml falcon tubes and centrifuged for 10 min. at 6000 ×g at 4 ºC. The pellet was washed thrice in 15 ml distilled water and centrifuged. Then it was dissolved in distilled water and the optical density (O.D) of the culture was set at position-1 at 600 nm=107–108 colony forming units (CFU) ml-1 for inoculation (Bhuvaneswari…

Sunflower plants grow well in average to rich soils. They need to grow their roots deep and wide, to enable them to withstand strong winds. If you have a choice, sandy soils are not recommended, as they are easily uprooted in loose soil. Rich soil is important, when growing giant varieties. Contrary to its name, we found they will tolerate some shade as we put them against an east wall of our house every year. However, they will grow their best in full sun. Deep roots help sunflowers to…

Infiltration investigation Introduction Infiltration is the process by which water on the ground surface enters the soil. The infiltration rate is the velocity or speed at which water enters into the soil. It is usually measured by the depth (in mm) of the water layer that can enter the soil in one hour. On the 2nd of October, we were split into groups and we had to do an infiltration investigation. The experiment was set out to find out whether the infiltrations rate throughout the school were…

Pine Island. We traveled swiftly despite the winds and searched for a spot to unload our canoes; the island itself is very rocky which made this task a little more challenging. This old-growth forested island is covered in a duff layer which is the “soil” and was laid down by the glaciers. This is where the plants and seedlings take root which is surprising because it was such a thin layer. It took hundreds and hundreds of years to lay this layer down, and it is very delicate. Not unlike the…