Germination Rates of Different Colors of Red Clover Seeds

Question Do the colors of red clover seeds affect their germination, growth, or end result?

Research Predictions Perhaps the colors of seeds will affect success rates of germination, as found in an earlier experiment a few years ago at our school.

Experimental Design We sorted the seeds by color, and then weighed the dry seeds and divided to find the per seed amount. Then the seeds were germinated under water in separate plastic cups with equal numbers of each color for two days, being interrupted each day to be counted and weighted. After the first days, the seeds were watered with equal drops of distilled water, gently dried each day to be weighed, counted, and placed back in the containers. This process will continue until Monday, when our experiment ends.

Difficulties

Probably due to human error, many of our seeds disappeared, especially in the red container, which lost 10 seeds overnight. This made our results less reliable and probably less accurate. Disappearing Seeds (and small sample size)

Conclusions

All containers reached at least 90% germination very quickly, with red a slight winner in this respect (although it was the one with fewest seeds, so it might be off) Most Seeds Germinated Successfully

All containers followed a similar growth pattern over time, with red coming out ahead and purple behind (although we cannot be sure) Drops in the graph prove existence of human error All Seeds had a Similar Growth Pattern

The order on both graphs: Red, Tan, Yellow, and Purple appeared to be related, suggesting that seeds which germinated earlier are further along in seed growth later. Seed Weight Seemed to Be Correlated with Speed of Germination

What we learned Red clover seeds of all colors germinate at similar rates Red clover seeds of all colors germinate at similar rates Red seeds appear to come out ahead and purple behind It is difficult to conduct a controlled experiment when we lose so many seeds Further study is needed to corroborate our findings

107.7 The END The End