Introduction
A few weeks ago my biology class grew some plants in our schools garden. We got the vegetable Kohlrabi, which is a type of cabbage. We let them grow for more than two weeks, and once they got a few inches we planted them into the grown. A few days after we planted them, they were completely gone. We discovered that someone ate our plants. Based on our evidence and background knowledge we formed a hypothesis and a testable experiment, to find out what ate our plants.
Question
(1) What ate our Kohlrabi plants?
(2) How can we find out what ate the plants?
Hypothesis
Based on the evidence that we have collected, we think that earwig bugs are the reason for the disappearance of the Kohlrabi. Earwig bugs are all over the garden. We did some research on, earwig's and there cabbages are apart of there dietary. Kohlrabi is a type of cabbage, therefore it makes sense that the earwigs would be eating on our plants. Although we cannot form any conclusions yet, because our plants were surrounded by other plants that were not Kohlrabi's and those plants got eaten as well. This mystery still has a lot of thought, and with clues we'll figure it out!
Background
Kohlrabi is an annual vegetable, and it is a type of cabbage. It can be eaten raw or cooked. We decided to use an earwig for our experiment because earwigs eat cabbage, so it would make sense if earwigs ate our plant. Another reason we think earwigs ate our pants is because in the Willow Glen Garden, there are a great number of earwigs that are in the dirt. We also used caterpillars because, they eat leaves and kale is a type of leaf.
Purpose
The purpose to do this experiment is to find out what happened to our plants. We already made an experiment but the reason why we did this is to see what the cause of these missing plants was? We also did this experiment to show our investigation on these missing plants. By planting these plants we wanted to help out our willow glen garden and to see how it can help out our enviornment. Next many people today are not eating health especially kids there aren't enough vegetables and fruits. But that is not their fault, there isn't enough nutrients to provide fr them . there are a lot of fast food restaurants and there parents aren't aware that what they are eating is not good for their children. In conclusion, our plant can help recognize the obesity in this world.
Materials
- 1 Earwig bug
- 2-4 pieces of fresh kale
- 1 caterpillar
- 2 rubber bands
- 1-2 small jars
- Tape
- Net Paper
- Calender (optional)
Procedure
For our experiment we bought Kale from the grocery store and tested a earwig bug and a caterpillar bug to see whether one of the bugs would eat the kale. Originally we were going to grow more of kohlrabi but we didn’t have enough time and the plants were going to be big enough to test so we decided to just use kohlrabi. Kale is the closest thing to kohlrabi we could find. For four days we kept an earwig and a caterpillar in two separate jars with 2-3 pieces of kohlrabi to see whether they would eat the plant. We kept watch every two hours to see how much of the kale was eaten. We then compared data to get our results!
Independent Variable
The independent variable is the thing in the experiment that is being tested. In our experiment the kale was being tested.
Dependent Variable
Dependent variable is the thing in the experiment that you can change. In our experiment, our dependent was the earwig and the caterpillar. We could have tested the experiment with other bugs and got different or the same results.
Controlled Variables
A controlled variable is something that you cant change for all the experiments tested. Are controlled experiment was the kale. We used kale for both the earwig and the caterpillar.
Detailed Steps
- Go to grocery store and buy a pack of kale (smallest pack you can find).
- Buy 2 small glass jars, with or without top.
- Buy rubber band, tape, and net paper or wax paper.
- Collect an earwig from outside somewhere.
- Rinse of Kale before putting it into the jar.
- Once rinsed off put 2-3 pieces of Kale into one of the glass jars.
- Then put the earwig bug into the glass jar, right away put the net paper or wax paper on top of the glass jar.
- As soon as you have the paper on top of the jar put a rubber band around the jar and paper to keep the paper in place.
- Put a few pieces of tape around the jar just to make sure the paper is in place.
- If you choose to use wax paper, make sure you poke a few holes on the paper so the earwig is able to get air.
- Once done putting the jar together, watch the bug for four days, to see whether or not the bug eats the kale.
- Record your data every two hours to see how much of the kale was eaten.
- After the four days are up and you’ve collected your data, collect a caterpillar from outside.
- Grab the second glass jar you purchased and rinse off 2-3 pieces of kale.
- Put the caterpillar into the glass jar, then put the net or wax paper on top of the jar.
- Wrap a rubber band around the jar, to make sure the paper stays in place.
- Also put a few pieces of tape around the jar just to make sure.
- If you used wax paper make sure you poke a few holes on the paper so the caterpillar will have air.
- Watch the bug for four days to see whether it eats the kale.
- Record your data every two hours to see how much of the kale was eaten.
- Put the earwig data and the caterpillar data together and form a conclusion.
Summary
For our project we tested an earwig we put the earwig in a jar with kale, 2 to 3 pieces and we watched the earwig every 2 hours for 4 days, to see if the earwig will eat the kale. We discovered that after one day the earwig did not eat the kale our hypothesis was wrong and we had to start all over and find a new bug to test. We did some research and we found out that caterpillars chomp on leaves of tree, and plants with flowers. Therefore, we decided to test a caterpillar. We put the caterpillar in a jar with kale and watched the caterpillar every 2 hours for 4 days to see if it ate it. The caterpillar did eat the kale, the caterpillar in total ate one whole leaf. We concluded that the caterpillar ate our plants, but the caterpillar may have not been the only bug that has eaten our plant.
Data and Results
Discussion
In our experiment we wanted to figure out what ate our plants. We did but it took a few obstacles getting there. Our hypothesis was that an earwig(s) ate our plant, because cabbage is in there diet. We were wrong and had to start all over again. We decided to use a caterpillar because caterpillars eat leaves. One reason are experiment didn't turn out the way we wanted it to is because we used kale instead of kohlrabi. Are experiment was based on kohlrabi but we could not regrow me kohlrabi because we didn't have enough time. It would have took 3-4 weeks to regrow kohlrabi and we started our experiment late, therefore we weren't provided with enough time. We were going to purchase already grown kohlrabi at the grocery store but we couldn't find any. Because of time we decided to use the best next thing which is kale. Kale could have effected our results because earwigs eat cabbage and kohlrabi is a type of cabbage, but kale is not a cabbage it is a type of leaf. Caterpillars do not eat cabbage they eat leaves and flowers, that's why the caterpillar ate the kale. But based on research and facts earwigs and caterpillars could have been the predator. There's also a lot more bugs in the garden that could have also ate the plants. If we were to do this experiment again we would take the time to grow more kohlrabi to have accurate results. We would also test more bugs and animals in or near the garden, because more then one thing could have ate the kohlrabi.Conclusion
In conclusion, our hypothesis was wrong the earwig did not eat the kale and we had to start over and test out the caterpillar. the caterpillar did eat the kale and we concluded the caterpillar could be the one reasons that our plant was eaten but other bugs or animals could have contributed.
