End of the year- have a great summer!

I hope everyone can get some sunshine and outdoor time.

Importance of Compost Piling by Sophia

                                                           

Have you ever wondered what the importance and benefits of composting is? Composting is basically just making a pile or heap of green waste and stirring it until it is broken down. Green waste is simply wetted down organic matter, such as leaves and food waste. Green waste normally breaks down after a course of weeks but can also take as long as months to break down. Compost is a key ingredient to organic farming.

There are many cool and unique ways to compost food waste. After it breaks down it is recycled and used as fertilizer and soil amendment. Compost waste is rich in nutrients which it is so good to use for plant growth.

You can use one of many ways to create a compost at the comfort of your own home. There are many composting benefits, like introducing beneficial organisms to soil, it’s good for the environment, and it reduces landfill waste. You can compost materials like animal manure, table scraps, paper, and even wood chips. There are multitudes of organisms, fungus and bacteria involved in the process of composting.

In composting, you will want green materials like lawn and landscape trimmings to reduces the amount of nitrogen. More green materials like fruit and vegetable peels would work great. Tea bags and coffee grounds are brown but are just as potent as green materials when it comes to nitrogen. For carbon, you’d want brown materials such as twigs, hay, and dry leaves.

You’ll definitely want to keep water around the compost pile to keep it moist. A compost pile needs oxygen to keep the bacteria and fungus in the compost pile alive. You can add worms in the pile, and bugs will find their way there.

When starting a compost pile, you want a certain amount of soil and scraps in your pile, this gives enough insulation and food for the organisms to live. For kitchen biology, we created two compost piles consisting of the same amount of vegetable and soil, and watered with the same amount of water but one was vermicomposting. The process was slow at first but towards the end, sped up and eventually showed progress. It was a great experience.

Nanotechnology by Richard

Summary:

            Nanotechnology is technology that is less than 100 nanometers wide. It can help with lots of different types of stuff. It helps with medicine, solar cells, batteries, food, fuel cells, and  better air quality. If it is breathed in it can damage your lung tissue and can cause chronic breathing problems. If it gets into your bloodstream it can kill you.

What I found most interesting about the topic:

What I found most interesting about the topic is that it can help bring the taste in food out more.

Three interesting facts that I learned:

1. It can help with better air quality because it can transform the vapors that come out of cars and factories into harmless gases.

2. If it gets into your bloodstream it can kill you.

3.  It is used to bring the taste in food out more.

Question:

Why do you think nanotechnology is harmful to us?

Soil by Mikayla

Soil is the “natural medium of growth and land”. Soil is very important to our world whether we realize it or not. It helps grow the things we need and has been used forever.

There are three types of soil; clay, sand and silt. Clay is the smallest soil particle there is. Sand is the largest particle, and silt is right in the middle. In each types of these soils there are different layers. The first layer is topsoil, which is the upper part. The second layer is subsoil, which is right below topsoil and has clay that is more compact. The very last layer is bedrock, this is the hard rock beneath the surface

            I find it very interesting that certain crops grow in the certain types of soil. For example in light textured soil, things such as vegetables and corn can grow. But in loamy soil almost everything can grow good in it. I also find it amazing that the more structured the soi is, the better plants grow in it. For example structured soil allows more water intake, so plants do better with this soil. The last thing that I find most interesting is that if you want to fix soil so it has better qualities, you just need to leave it alone - it will fix itself. I would have thought that you would need to do a ton of things to it.

            My question to everyone is how can you help improve the soil?

The Nutrient Cycles By Arissa

          The nutrient cycles are a crucial part in all ecosystems, they are responsible for the reuse of water, energy, and food. All life relies on three main cycles, the carbon cycle, nitrogen cycle, and water cycle.

          Starting with the carbon cycle, carbon has the most important part to play in all of the ecosystems. Throughout the course of the carbon cycle plants extract carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, then perform photosynthesis, animals consume the plants and replace the carbon dioxide through breathing. This process is also responsible for providing energy for factories, trains, planes, and cars in the form of fossil fuel. This is a constant cycle, to bring us back to the beginning, after the death of an animal, fungi and bacteria break down the organic matter and allow the growth of plants.

Much like carbon, nitrogen is equally important to all ecosystems. Although nitrogen is present in our atmosphere it’s supply is limited. Nitrogen-fixing bacteria are made to transform nitrogen into ammonia. These bacteria bring the converted nitrogen into the water and soil for the plants. Plants then acquire the nitrogen in the form of ammonia.

The water cycle is what life relies on, it consists of three main parts, evaporation (transpiration), condensation, and precipitation.  Evaporation is the extraction of water from bodies of water heated up by the sun, creating water vapor or clouds. Transpiration is process in which plants soak up water through their roots then the water evaporates as plants release water through small pores. Condensation is the collection of water in the air, after condensation comes precipitation. Precipitation comes in the form of rain, sleet, snow, and hail which falls to the ground bringing us back to the beginning.

These three cycles are what is keeping us alive, they are crucial to all ecosystems and environments. Food, water, and energy are all a part of these cycles.

Cite Sources: "The Water Cycle (article) | Ecology." Khan Academy. Khan Academy, 2017. Web. 13 Apr. 2017. <https://www.khanacademy.org/science/biology/ecology/biogeochemical-cycles/a/the-water-cycle>.

Jamie, Taylor, and Jen Moreau. "Nutrient Cycles: Recycling in Ecosystems, The Carbon and Nitrogen Cycles." ScienceAid. Science Aid, 2017. Web. 13 Apr. 2017. <https://scienceaid.net/biology/ecology/nutrient.html>.

Composting by Lydia

Composting is when organic material gets decomposed and then is used as a method of recycling or a way for people to help people increase their soil fertility. There are many different methods of compositing. You can have pile composting, open bin composting, or closed bin composting. These are just some of the many ways of composting. This is method that a lot of people enjoy because there is little to no cost and the boost in your gardens fertilization is mind blowing.

-       How many different kinds of compost total do you think there are?

Something that I find interesting about my topic is that all different kinds of organic food can change everything about it and become dirt.

1.    Composting saves money and is helping the world stay in better shape.

2.    It improves everything about the soil and the way plants grow in it.

3.    The nutrients in the soil can almost double when we use these composite materials.

GENETICS by Sophia

Genetics is the study of heredity. In living organisms, there are genes, genetic variation, and heredity. The main idea of genetics being the study of heredity is that we observe that just about all living things inherit traits from both parents. The work of Gregor Mendel is what sparked the understanding of this process. This started in the mid-19th century and is still a huge subject of discussion.

Gregor Mendel was a scientist who studied the nature of inheritance in plants. For his work, Mendel traced inheritance patterns of traits in peas. After tracing this, he would describe them mathematically. Mendel concluded through this study that inheritance of many traits could be explained through rules and simple ratios. Very few people understood the concept of heredity until after Mendel’s death, when other scientists took on studies similar to his.

With genetics comes gene mutations. Gene mutations are alterations in the DNA sequence that is permanent. DNA sequences are what makes up a gene. Mutations range is size and can affect anything from a base pair to a large chromosome segment that includes multiple genes. Many children are born with gene mutations, like Sickle-Cell Anemia and Tay-Sachs disease. That’s just part of life.

Idaho’s State Flower, the Syringa by Joe

INTRODUCTION

The syringa (philadelphus lewisii) has been the state flower of Idaho since 1931, and was an obvious choice for the position due to its beauty and importance to the Native American as a means of creating tools. It grows on a shrub that can reach almost ten feet in height, with flowers growing in clusters on the ends of long stems. The wooded part of the shrub provided wood that the Native Americans used to create harpoons, bows, arrows, and numerous other tools requiring a wooden shaft. It is fascinating that an aromatic and aesthetically pleasing object would also be necessary for some cultures to hunt and forage for food.

INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT SYRINGAS

1.       The flower is named after Meriwether Lewis, as he was the first to collect and publish about it.

2.       The bark and leaves can be used to make a soap.

3.       Quail, deer, and elk are known to forage syringa.

 

QUESTION

How was syringa an integral part of the pioneering Native American tribes?

REFERENCES

Boise National Forest - Nature & Science. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Apr. 2017.

"Syringa." State Symbols USA. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Apr. 2017.

Light bulbs by Triston

Light bulbs can be put into anything that produces an electric charge, like a lantern or a flashlight if your are going camping, or if you need to go somewhere that doesn't have a light in the room. They go on the front of your car, and the back of it. They can go on any motor vehicle that you want you just need the extra parts. There are are different types of light bulbs like LED lights and there are incandescent, and CFL bulbs

Does temperature impact performance of a light bulb?

            I find this topic interesting because i might just buy LED lights because they last for 20 years with just one bulb.

Three neat facts about light bulbs are that the first light bulb that was ever invented was made in 1802 by Humphrey Devy. Halogen light bulbs were first produced in the 1950s. Another neat fact is that it takes 6 billion electrons to light up one 100-watt bulb for only one second.

Main Plant Parts By Brooklyn

          Plants play huge roles in our lives and on our planet. Without them, there is no us. They provide us with the oxygen we need to survive. With plants being very important pieces in our society, how do we not know more about them? Very few people have knowledge about plants and their anatomy.

            There are four main parts of plants. There are roots, leaves, flowers, and stems. All are extremely important to the plant and help it survive.

Roots are the thin branches on the bottom of the plant that help anchor it. They also store food and absorb water. There are two different types of roots, tap and fibrous. A tap root is one main root, it is usually very hard to pull (for example a carrot). Fibrous roots are many little roots that branch out and all play an equal role. They do not go very deep.

Stems help determine the plant’s size and position.  They move the leaves in order to get sunlight so the plant can photosynthesize. The xylem is the center of the stem, it moves the water from the roots to the leaves. The phloem is outside of the xylem and moves sugars down from the leaves to the roots so it can be stored.

            Leaves make food for the plants through photosynthesis. They collect the sun’s light and use it to make energy that the plant uses as food. Monocots are plants with straight-veined leaves. For example, palm trees are monocots. Dicots are plants with puzzle-veined leaves. The leaves branch out all over the place and have no particular pattern. For example, a maple is a dicot.

            Last, but not least, are the flowers. These help the plant reproduce. The stamen of the flower has pollen on it which is transferred  to other flower’s stigma by insects.

The more you know, the better off you are! Plants help us in so many ways and we should really take the time to learn more about them. Here’s my question for you: Which part of the plant is the most important, and why?