Are you ready to take a guess?
You’ll be seeing a lot of these this month.
What kind of seeds are these?
Edit:Â The answer is now posted.
Year: 2010 (Page 16 of 70)
Did you guess what the mystery seeds were last week? Here’s a hint:
Yes, those spiky-looking seeds will grow into carrots.
The carrot, Daucus carota, is a biennial. That means in the first year it stores up food in its extra large root. If you leave the root in the ground and conditions are right, at the end of the second season the plant will flower and produce seeds.
This is a bud.
Starting to open…
almost there…
flowering!
Along come the little bees to pollinate the flowers. Don’t the flower clusters look like miniature bouquets?
And then you have seeds. Why do you think the seeds have those spines on them?
If you would like to learn more about carrots, the World Carrot Museum has an entire page of excellent experiments and activities to do with carrots for kids, plus oodles of information about the history and uses of carrots.
One fun activity to do with carrots from the grocery store is to take the tops (that you cut off anyway when you eat them) and set them cut end down in a small dish of pebbles. (See the photograph above). Cover half way with water, allowing the green part to be exposed to the air. Keep the bottom covered with water and the cut tops should start to sprout.
Make this into an experiment by comparing the ability of the tops to sprout to the ability of sections further down the root. Will a “baby carrot” sprout?
This fun post is thanks to my son, who asked the simple question:Â Can you grow a carrot plant by planting a carrot root you buy in the store? The answer is:Â as long as there’s some green at the top of the carrot, it will grow into a plant that produces seeds (if grown during the correct season for your climate). The root is no longer edible, but you can try planting the seeds next year.
Have you ever had a carrot plant go to seed?
Ever have those little organizational tasks you know you should do, but there never seems to be enough time? Today I finally finished one of those. I’ve made a list of all the science experiments posted here at Growing With Science, organized by topic. Now you can click that little button that says Experiment List at the top of the page and you can quickly (hopefully) find a fun science activity. Looking for a science fair project? The list should help you there as well.
if you ever have any questions about the posts, would like to know more, or if you have a topic you’d like to see covered, please feel free to send me an e-mail at growingwithscience (at) gmail (dot) com.
I was so excited about the new summary, I’ve included here. Enjoy!
Below is a summary of the science experiment blog posts, organized by topic. The links to the posts are in red.
Biology
Mycology (Fungi)
- Making a spore print
- Characteristics
- Decomposition Experiment
Ecology
What’s Under a Rock?- Exploring a habitat
Botany
- Make an algal collection
- Investigate food chains
- Investigate how humans use algae for food
- Algae produce oils that can be used for biofuel
Mosses, Ferns, Liverworts and Horsetails: Science Activities
- Identification
- Searching for Spores
- Moss habitats
- Tree Transpiration
- How far does the water have to travel from roots to top of the tree?
Experiments with Tree Leaves:
Putting the leaves back on the trees- leaf identification
Fall leaf color chromatography
Saguaro Cactus Activities
- Why Spines?
- Waxy Coating
Ornithology (Birds)
Zoology (Animals)
- Fainting goats
Experiments with Isopods (pillbugs or rolypolies)
- Identification
- Frog songs
- Eat or be eaten
Ocean and Shore Animals
Investigate an animal (sea slug) that can make its own food
- fish anatomy
- moving through water
Science with Pets
- Identification/Classification of Rodents
- Food/Nutrition
- Making Houses and Toys
- Animal Behavior
- Mouse Development
Entomology (Insects)
- Gardening for bees
- Honey bees and water
- Honey bee communication and dances
- Bee nests
Where do insects go in the winter?
- Ant anatomy
- Ant pheromones
Human Biology
Experiments with the senses of taste and smell
Chemistry
- Shape-memory alloys
- Shape memory polymers
- UV beads
- Density
- A Density Column
- Elephant’s toothpaste
- Acids and Bases
- Using chemicals to make light
- Glowing under ultraviolet light
- Light sticks
- Day-Glo
Physics
Activities having to do with hunting for planets outside the solar system.
- Make a rainbow
- Activity: Make your own spectrometer from a cereal box.
- The Doppler Effect
Investigate the amount of light pollution and how it effects how we see the stars at night
Experiments with movement of floating trash
- Test sand samples with a magnet
- Make sand
- Ice spikes
- Ice cube rescues
- Freezing and thawing water
- Floating and sinking
- dry ice
Boats and Floating
How long can a paper boat float?
Results of paper boats
Can you make a boat travel across a bathtub without touching it?
Results
Do pumpkins or apples float?
Why do they float?
Movement of water in small containers
Meteorology
For more information, see Roberta Gibson Writes.