In September, we started an experiment to help our study of ecosystems. We created a lot of mini environments. We used soil, water, seeds, and duckweed. We put the soil in a round, plastic container before we put the duckweed in the soil. Then we got a tall, plastic measuring cylinder and added 120 milliliters of water. After all of that, we used the same seeds we used at the Pete Dye Golf Course and added them into the container. We picked our groups and got some papers on the Scientific Method. Our first step was to write a question. Our question was “What happens if an ecosystem changes?” The next step was to research. A few people researched the water plant, duckweed, because they felt it might affect the ecosystem. We learned that it is an invasive species when it is in its natural environment. Writing a hypothesis was our next step. Then we wrote out our procedures. We followed these directions and then set it up. Our variable was the number of seeds. We also set up a control. We did drawings to illustrate change. We took seven days to observe our plants.To go with our measuring change theme, we measured height of the plants from seed, height of the soil, and the surface area of duckweed. Finally we drew conclusions. We learned that the invasive species didn’t overtake the other plants. We feel that because no additional water was added to the container it did not thrive. At the Pete Dye Course, we might use that same information to help in eliminating the Sericea Lespedeza. Two questions we still have are “How do the duckweed and Lespedeza compare in nutritional needs?” “Are there other factors that affect plant growth?”
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