Planting Science Experiment By: Julia Henry Nathan AKA: THE ARTICHOKES

Question and Hypothesis Q: Will different things in the soil effect the the height of alfalfa plants (fertilizer water, compost, everything, and plain soil made of peat moss, top soil, and sand). H: Our hypothesis was that the everything experiment would grow the tallest plants because compost and fertilizer water are the perfect things plants need to grow.

Variables Dependent variable: height of plant Independent variable: Type of soil (ordinary soil, half soil half compost, everything, and soil watered with fertilizer water.

Experimental Design For our experiment we used two cups for growing plants per independent variable. We put 500 ml of potting soil in control cup #1 and #2. We put 250 ml of compost, and 250 ml potting soil in Compost containers #1 and #2. In everything 1 and 2 we put 250 ml of potting soil, and 250 ml of compost. We watered the Everything and fertilizer water plants with 30 ml with Miracle Grow water once per week. We watered each plant with 30ml of water every day (including the fertilizer water plants).

Steps #1: Soak all the seeds on a wet paper towel over two nights. #2: fill four of the cups with 250mL of compost and and 250mL of soil water two of the cups with fertilizer water, four of the cups with 500 ml of soil and water two with the fertilizer water. #3: Fill the 3785 ml milk jug with 15 ml of fertilizer solution. Water specified plants once per week. #4: After two days of soaking, place ten seeds in each container one half to one centimeter below the dirt. #5: Water each plant once every day with the appropriate measurements, and observe as needed.

Alfalfa plant height (in mm)

Plants under grow light

These are pictures of some of our plants.

Conclusion Our conclusion was that the experiments with the ferilizer water grew the best/healthiest plants. The compost plant grew the tallest but they were very skinny and soon fell over and died. Our hypothesis was wrong, though further tests may change the data. If we were to redo this experiment we would use a different type of plant that would grow taller and germinate faster.