Effect of Road Salt on Seed Germination

Introduction Today you will be setting up a controlled experiment on the effect of road salt on seed germination Write the title ‘Introduction ‘under your lab accession number and title Then copy the information from the next slide under the section ‘Introduction’

Relevance Road salt is used in Loudoun County in HUGE quantities during the winter LC went from just adding de-icing agents during a storm Now the county pre-treats roads excessively In addition, when we are in a drought situation, farmers irrigate their land with river water After many years of irrigation, farmland contains so much river salt that crops die, remember Babylon!

Is salt bad? Yes Most plants are not salt tolerant When exposed to too much salt, they die

Our original and creative question If salt is bad for plants, is it also bad for seeds?

Hypothesis Now it’s your turn to make a decision Write an hypothesis Hypothesis format If salt is added to seeds, it will/will not decrease seed germination Choose either will or will not

Procedure-Write this down There will be 3 groups: first row of tables will be control group, second row low salt group, third row high salt group For each table gather appropriate zip loc bag, marked with C, hi, or lo and 1, 2,3,4,5 2 seeds 1 cotton puff Add seeds to the bag Record the number of your bag here________

Procedure continued One group at a time, go to the appropriate salt/no salt station and dip the cotton puff for 10 seconds in the liquid Add the wed cotton puff to your seed bag Place the seed bag on the shelf labeled with your block number Check for seed germination during class for 2 weeks Add your data to your data table

Data Table Copy this table from the board into your nature journal

Discussion What does a seed need to germinate? Water Light Soil Write your answer in your nature journal

Results After 2 weeks of data collection, draw a graph of the class data X axis will be Control, Low Salt, High Salt Y axis will be number of seeds germinated This will be a bar graph

Analysis What happened during the experiment? How many seeds germinated in the control? How many seeds germinated in the low salt? How many seeds germinated in the high salt?

Conclusion Did you accept or reject your hypothesis? Write : Based on the results of this experiment, I accept/ reject (choose 1) my hypothesis. Therefore, salt does/does not (choose 1) have an effect on seed germination. Briefly describe how LC should change or not change its de-icing practices based on your data.