The Distribution of Daises, Plantains, Moss and Grass.

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        Ecology Investigation                 

ECOLOGY INVESTIGATION

                

AIM

I aim to find out the distribution of daises, plantains, moss and grass. I will measure the distribution in two different area’s of the school ground; the first area is in front of the dining hall where there is plenty of sunlight, the area is trampled frequently, I labelled this area DH for Dinner Hall. The second area is in front of School House boarding house, there are lots of tall trees here, so there is a light difference between the two areas, this area also gets trampled quite a lot. We labelled this area SH for School House.

PREDICTION

I predict that in the open area there will be more grass and daises than in the shaded area. The reason for this is that the plants with a small surface area require more sunshine than plants with a large surface area to create the same amount of chemical energy by photosynthesis. In the shaded area in front of School House (SH) I expect to find moss and plantains, plants having a large surface area are able to process the shaded sunlight more efficiently.

   

PLAN        

For my investigation I will take at least 20 quadrates from each of these areas. This will involve a half-meter square placed on the ground, and then I will take readings of all the plant life in the selected area of the quadrate. These readings would include the plants that I have chosen to measure, i.e. daises, plantains, moss and grass. In these areas it is possible to get more than 100% coverage because it is possible that the area is 90% covered by moss and yet growing up through it is a 40% covering of grass. I must take the same amount of quadrates in each area to make sure there is a fair test. It is essential to have a fair test other wise the results I take would be inaccurate. After taking quadrates I will measure the light intensity of the area where I took the quadrates. This involves a light intensity meter and walking around taking the readings. After completing the quadrate and light readings I will continue with my investigation by taking the soil pH readings, water content, humus content and a soil profile. To obtain results from these soil experiments first I must collect some soil, to do this I will need a bag of soil from each area. I will use the trowel to dig up some soil and then to obtain the moisture content I must evaporate all the spare moisture. To do this I need 10 grams of the soil from each area in two separate evaporation dishes. The two evaporation dishes are placed into an oven for two to five days, after that the two soils are weighed again, to see how much the soils have decreased in weight.

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After the water content experiment has been done I will then move on to humus content, I can only do the humus experiment after the moisture experiment otherwise I would evaporate water as well as burn off humus so I would not get an accurate result. To find the humus content I heat the remaining dry soil on a high flame for half an hour, all the humus (dead animal and plant matter) is burned off and the remaining soil in measured to see how much weight has been lost. The result of how much is lost is the ...

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