Last Post - Sadly...

Here are the photos for the 12th June, 2010:

Toilet

Toilet

Growing Green Garlic Stalks

These are the photos of the plants after 3 weeks of planting.

Bathroom

Toilet:

It appears that the garlic stalks grow better in the toilet than in the bathroom. Awesome!

That means music does have an effect on plant growth.

Now I just need to write a report. The hardest part!

31st May 2010 - Love the difference!

Ok, so after about 2 and a half weeks of planting my garlic, there are some cool observations and results!

On 31st May, 2010, I took some photos of my growing plants. I have to say I'm quite impressed with the outcome, because I can easily see the height of the plants:


In the toilet, there are three stems altogether sprouting from the garlic.
In one bowl, there are two stems - 10cm and 4cm each.
The other bowl has a 4.5 cm high stem.








In the bathroom, there are three stems altogether emerging from the garlic.
In one bowl, there are 2 stems - 10 cm high and 3 cm high.
In the other bowl, there is a 1cm high stem.







So far, the plants in the toilet seem to grow the fastest. That means the plant with the music in the same room is growing faster than the other plants in the other room. Well done, guys!

I Can See the Resemblance!

I took these photos on 25th May, 2010, which means 9 days after the first day of the experiment. The garlic show some hint of growth, but the ones from the toilet and the bathroom look similar; that is, they grew about the same height.

Toilet

Here I can see a stem emerging from the soil where the bottom garlic is planted on (sorry I cannot edit and put an arrow to show you where I mean!).

Bathroom


There is a growth there too!

So there are two bowls with growth of garlic in the soils, but the other two plants are still pretty much the same as the beginnign of the experiment.

Day 4 - not much progress

Yesterday was my fourth day of planting the garlic in the soil. There was not much difference to the first day of planting, but I can tell that the garlics grew a tiny bit.

Here are the photos I took yesterday:

Bathroom - no music

Toilet - music

So far, I've played a handful of classical songs for the plants in the tiolet for apporximately three hours, usually from 6-9p.m.

Garlic Experiment

Don't worry, my experiment is still about the effect of music on plant growth. It's just that for the plants I am using garlic since I think it grows quite well and easy to observe with.

So yesterday, I started my experiment (I know, it's very late since it's due in A MONTH!).

That's what I did:

I planted 3 pieces of garlic in each bowl of soil, and there are 4 bowls of them.

The pieces of garlic were buried in the soil, so that only the top of it is still visible, like the photos I took of them on their first day of planting.

I placed two bowls in the bathroom, the other two in the toilet, where I decided to put classical music on for three hours each day.

Photo 1 - In the toilet: 3 pieces of garlic planted in each of the two bowls of soil.

Photo 2 - In the bathroom: 3 pieces of garlic planted in each of the two bowls of soil.


This is NOT my method, it is what I did for my experiment so far. My method is in the previous post.

I better start moving with my experiment.

Yours truly

Michelle Zhang

Blog 2 - Method

Here is my method for my Student Research Project. My climatic graph is in a previous entry.

Step 1 - A pot of plants is placed in a quiet room for 8 weeks.
Step 2 - A similar pot of plants is placed in another room in the same duration and time as the other pot of plants.
Step 3 - Music is played throught the speakers for 3 hours in the second room.
Step 4 - Step 3 is repeated daily.
Step 5 - Both pots of plants are watered every day.
Step 6 - Observations (appearance, height) of the plants in each room are recorded weekly.
Step 7 - The experiment (steps 1 to 6) is repeated.

The plants is most likely to be beans.

Dorothy Retallack's Experiment

I've looked at some websites about the music on effect of palnt growth, and a few of them contain information about Dorothy Retallack's experiment. So I looked at these websites about her experiment:
http://www.ukpianos.co.uk/plants-respond-to-music.html
http://www.dovesong.com/positive_music/plant_experiments.asp

In her experiment, Retallack placed the same types of plants in 3 different chambers. In each chamber she:

• put music on for 8 hours non-stop
• played music on for three hours intermittently (irregular times)
• played no music

She watched her plants grow and observed that:

• the plants that was in a room with 8 hours of continuous music died the quickest
• the pants with the music played for 3 hours grew quickly and healthily
• the plants with no music on grew not as well as the second one, but better than the first one

She also did some other experiments to extend that experiment. I'm not sure if her results were accurate or reliable. She did publish a book called 'The Sound of Music and Plants' based on her experiment though.

I am going to buy some plants, put them in two different rooms. In one room, the plants will be listening' to a classical music for 3 hours non-stop, because many websites state that classical, soothing music helps plants grow better than hard rock music. In the other room, there will be no music played.

I will allow the plants to grow, and record their appearance and height, etc.

So far, I still dunno which plants to get. I might probably get wattles or weeds.

Graph and thoughts of SRP

Here's my beautiful graph. I hope it's right because it is good to get things right.
If it's not right, then I guess I have to be brighter in the future.

About my SRP, I've been looking for which plants to grow.

I've looked at various websites and most of them say bamboos, but it's clearly not that possible to plant that for some reason. Beans may be possible. I migh go to different shops that specialise in plant anatomy to find out which plants grow the best (meaning the fastest and most distinct, therefore I can tell if it grew better than the others).

Time effficiency is a factor because as many of you (if anyone actually reads my blog) know obediently and frustratingly, we only have 2 months to finish our whole SRP!

So I better find some info on my research project by the time school starts.

Or is that too late?

Weather...

For my experiment, I should consider the weather. Of course, I should grow the plants on a sunny day rather than on a rainy day, because sunlight can make plants grow better than the rain. So I'll do that. I'll grow them when it's fine and sunny weather, about 20-30 degrees Celsius, maybe a little cooler since it's going to be nearly winter.

Let the music play!

Does music have an effect on plant growth?
So I have looked at a few websites as to the information about my research project, and I’ve found out that:

• Plants respond to stimuli, that is, they react to something that causes reactions
• Plants do not respond differently depending on what type of music or artist (e.g. they would not grow faster when listening to Taylor Swift rather than Linkin Park)
• The relationship between plants and music have something to do with mechanical waves, which are waves that require a medium to travel through (i.e. sound)
• Therefore plants do not grow faster when music is played because they hear it, but because of vibrations of sound waves
• Music can affect plants positively or negatively
  
  Sources
  http://www.helium.com/items/989723-how-music-can-help-plant-growth
  http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1126916/does_music_affect_plant_growth.html
  
  So my experiment will be something like this:
  I will grow 3-5 plants normally for a week. The differences with regards to their appearance and height will be recorded. I might repeat these steps for another week to conduct a fair test.
  The following week I will buy the same number and type of plants and grow them. This time, however, the plants will have the music played for them for 2 hours every day for a week (the same song should be played for the entire experiment). The appearance and the growth of the plants will be recorded.
  The process above will be repeated the following week.
  This is just a general idea of how my experimentation would be. I hope it is going to be a great and fun experiment!
  
  Oh yeah, there are variables that should be considered:
  
  Independent variables:
  
• number of plants
• type and size of plants
• period of time the plants will grow

Dependent variables (during experiment):

• growth of plants
• appearance of the plants

There should be some more, but so far I can only think of these.

Don't worry, I will think of some more. Eventually.

The winner is

Judging from my previous entries, it seems like I favour 'the effect of music on plant growth'. So, I guess I should do that.
Or something.
I will just choose it and I know it will be a lot of work, but I guess that's the 'beauty' of the project:
The more work you put in, the more you learn and get good marks.
Sure...I'd love that.
Anywho, should add some stuff about music and plants.
Hmmm...I will do that laters.

Bye for now.

So much to choose...so much to lose...

Um...I am kind of in a state where I'm torn between many ideas of my SRP. So...what do I choose?
I seriously have no idea. Actually, I have quite a few ideas, but that's the problem:
WHICH IDEA SHOULD I CHOOSE?

So far, these are my ideas:

• the effect of music on plant growth
• do all types of liquid expand when frozen?
• which substance removes graffiti the fastest or bestest?
• do plants grow faster in soil or in water?
• more ideas will be blocking my train of thought and relief

So you see, I'm really trying to choose an idea. I'd like to inny-minny-miney-mo, but I can't. That's just too risky and childish, anyways.

Please let me choose something by, like, tomorrow!

Ideas...

I've been thinking of some ideas for my SRP, I don't know what to choose...

1. What effect does music have on plants? e.g. do plants grow faster with classical, rock or country music on?
2. Will you learn better after doing physical activity or after you rest?
3. How much water does orange contain?

I have no idea what to choose, I seem to be changing my mind constantly but oh well, doing SRP is not meant to be straightforward, is it?

Hello World

Hello world,
I guess it's my first entry, so hi.