Good Grief.

oh gee, great.

So I decided to add all my photos onto my report because I think it'll look more genuine LOL.

Then I asked Ms Zhang if it was necessary to put all the photos on the report and she said that you really only need to put the photos on your report that you're going to talk about. O_O

I spent like 3.5 hours trying to put all the photos neatly, in order and now.. sigh.

Oh well, I'm not sure if I'm going to put it on. I'll see at the end when I've finished my report. Yes that's all (:

and btw, I have gotten around to watering my sunflowers in the last few days after my experiment finished and yes, the backyard soil sunflowers have wilted pretty quickly. They're like literally dried and shrivelled up. However, I have watered them, so it's all good. (:

And btw, the potting mix and compost sunflowers haven't really been affected by the shortage of water. Just sayin'.

LAST DAY.

SOOOO, I'VE TOTALLY, UTTERLY, COMPLETELY FINISHED MY EXPERIMENT!

AREN'T YOU JUST SO PROUD OF ME? LIKE REALLY, THIS IS THE ONLY TIME I'VE FINISHED WHAT I'VE STARTED LOL.

Well, yes, I measured my plants and I've posted them on my excel spreadsheet and I've copied that table and the line graph I produced into Microsoft Word, onto my report. I feel so.. organised. For once.

hahaha, that's a first.

OMG, did you know that Sam Stosur beat Serena Williams? That is like, dude, soo awesome! AND, Rafa Nadal is through! hehehe, I'm a huge tennis fan btw, even though I might not seem like one.

Yes, that's all.

I'm really going to miss this blog. NOTE: the sarcasm. LOL

not really, I kinda will miss this blog. :/

What will I be doing in my free time from now on? Facebook? (not like I don't already)

Well, it's getting late and I'm off to sleep. Not really, I'm going to continue eating M&Ms. Btw, are the brown M&Ms the ones with less food colouring? OH WELL. I like the blue ones. I like being a blue tongue lizard - without the lizard part. (:

toodles.

one day to go.

omgggggg, in less than 24 hours, i will have officially finished my srp! :D

so proud of myself. 7 weeks. sighhhh. (:

WELL, i don't particularly like trudging outside in my thongs at 11pm into the rain to bring my plants back into shelter so that it won't die, buuuuuut, i did.

Only because I said to myself, "Only one more day you have to deal with this. Only one more day.."

so, it's all good now. and wow, it's grown so tall in such a short time. well 7 weeks isn't really all that short but close enough. it's like.. my baby. my precious baby; I planted the seeds and waited for it to grow.. and grow.. and grow. And it did! Despite comments that when you actually want your plants to grow, they don't and when you don't mind if they do, they grow.

hahahaha, oh yes.

well, i decided to put like 21 photos of my sunflowers into the "results" section of my report. do you think that's too many photos? It's one photo of sunflowers in compost, one in backyard soil and one in potting mix for each week, multiplied by 7 gives 21. However, there's still tomorrow. Sooo, 24. enough? LOL.

helloo? anyone there to answer me? (:

yes, feel free to answer/comment on my blog post/s. hehehe

well, off to sleep.

'til next time, BAZINGA!

hahahaha, i felt the need to say that.

Sunflowers - Results Week 1 - Week 6

ABOVE: Results for Potting Mix

ABOVE: Results for Compost

ABOVE: Results for Backyard Soil

So, here are the results for my experiment so far. The last column is for the average of the plants for that day when they were measured. The sunflowers were measured weekly.

Update - Peas (may be unnecessary)

well, even though i may not be using my peas for my experiment anymore, i just thought i'd say that they have grown to around 64 cm.

i'm so proud of myself and them.

yesterday, i needed to collect larger wooden stakes from our old garage to use as stakes. and since they're curling around and around, i decided to do that to my peas around the stakes. it actually looks pretty cool! :D

and i have taken some photos. i shall post them up later on. (:

i never knew peas could grow so well, so quickly.

and guess what, i'm uncapped tomorrow. just sayin'.

(:

Photos - Day 42

Sunflowers - Potting Mix

Sunflowers - Compost

Sunflowers - Backyard Soil

Finally found my day 42 photos. And they are late but here they are. (:

They have consistently grown and my plants have shown that the backyard soil sunflowers have definitely grown taller than the ones in the compost soil.

Photos - Day 35

Sunflowers - Potting Mix

Sunflowers - Compost

Sunflowers - Backyard Soil

hehe, these are my day 35 photos. Yes, I know they're a bit late but still, they're here aren't they? (:

I still have to find my day 42 photos. I know they are somewhere on my computer. I shall find them tomorrow. and post them up tomorrow.

NOTE: the backyard soil sunflowers may seem to be taller because sure enough, there are more sunflowers than I remember planting.. oh my gosh. My mum planted them. which means she decided to add a few more. That doesn't matter because I've chosen 6 for results, like the potting mix one and the compost one. And, it's all going fine. (:

Now, I'm back to doing my tutoring homework. sigh, what a way to end a Friday night.

research.

Hellooo, did some more research just then.

Apparently: (this is all from http://www.agr.state.nc.us/cyber/kidswrld/plant/nutrient.htm)

Soil Texture (the amount of sand, silt, clay, and organic matter in the soil)

Soil texture affects how well nutrients and water are retained in the soil. Clays and organic soils hold nutrients and water much better than sandy soils. As water drains from sandy soils, it often carries nutrients along with it. This condition is called leaching. When nutrients leach into the soil, they are not available for plants to use.

An ideal soil contains equivalent portions of sand, silt, clay, and organic matter. Soils across North Carolina vary in their texture and nutrient content, which makes some soils more productive than others. Sometimes, the nutrients that plants need occur naturally in the soil. Othertimes, they must be added to the soil as lime or fertilizer.

Maybe this is a reason why plants should grow faster in more organic soil such as potting mix because the texture affects how well nutrients and water can be kept in the soil rather than with backyard soil where the texture is not thick enough to absorb all the nutrients and water necessary.

more infoooo on compost soil: (http://www.uvm.edu/vtvegandberry/factsheets/pottingmix.html)

Compost is rarely used by itself as a potting medium. Compost alone does not have the optimal water holding characteristics, and soluble salt levels are often higher than optimal for potting mix. Plus, high quality compost can be relatively expensive so it makes sense to dilute it with other ingredients like peat. Organic potting mixes are typically made with 20% to 50% compost by volume, depending on the type of crop that will be grown in the mix, the container size, and the growing conditions.

This should explain the slower growth of the sunflowers in compost. I always thought that the more nutrients it had, the faster it would grow. That is true in some cases but not in others; just like here where water cannot be held strongly enough. ooooh, nice, I like it when things make sense. (:

Update - Day 40

hello, I realised that I haven't posted in a while.

Well, nothing exciting has happened over the past 2 weeks. Just the usual, taking its time to grow.

Yes, I just decided to do my experiment for 6 weeks. And today is Day 40, making Thursday the last day for my experiment. Even though my experiment stops, I will continue to grow my sunflowers into the garden.

And, have I informed you that I am only doing sunflowers now? Well, I am and I'm just going to use my peas as a further observation into my experiment. For example, I am going to use it as backup evidence for my results. It's much easier this way than trying to measure tangly peas that like to tie themselves to each other.

Yes, oh and I'll post day 35 photos tomorrow. We're a bit out of internet at the moment. LOL

(:

DAY 35!

guess what!

my plants have survived in my backyard's environment for 35 day!

cool or what? and apparently, my friends have doubted my experiment saying that if you actually wait for your plants to grow, they don't grow. oooh snap, they did. (:

anyway, new results into my results book. hehehe

my experiment is going nicely.

one thing though, my compost soil sunflowers aren't growing taller than my backyard soil.i hypothesised that it would definitely grow taller than backyard soil and possibly even the potting mix plants but no, doesn't seem this way right now.