As a follow-up to the bean-in-a-milk-carton-with-a-fold-down-flap experiment, we were supposed to move on to sprouting beans in three cups, then putting one in a dark cupboard and stopping giving water to another to show that -- *gasp* -- plants need light and water.
But I did that experiment when Faith went through the kindergarten curriculum, and Eric had the benefit of having already been through the preschool book and learned that plants need four things: sunlight, water, soil, and air. So I decided to switch up the experiment a bit by planting beans in four cups and depriving each of one of the necessities from the beginning. I wasn't really sure if any of them would sprout, but here's what we got:
These beans I put in a cup on a wet paper towel; they got sunlight, water and air but no soil. To my surprise, they sprouted! They look kind of like little aliens, but they sprouted. Today, three days later, they've even poked their heads above the edge of the cup. On Friday, I had to lift the wet paper towel out of the bottom of the cup to get a good photo of them.
These are the little albino beans from the dark cupboard: water, soil and air but no light. This evening, the furthest-along one has a freakishly long stem in a vain effort to grow up high enough to find the sun.
And these are the beans that got sunlight, water, and soil but no air. Of all our four cups they grew the healthiest. Of course, being shut in a Ziploc gallon freezer bag isn't the same as being in a vacuum in a bell jar, and I did open it once to water them so it's not overly scientific.
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