Lab # 2: How does your biome grow?
Problem: What impact do abiotic factors have on biomes?
Hypothesis: Use what you know about ecosystems and ecology to write a hypothesis
indicating the effect of an abiotic factor of your choice on the germination of plants in a
model biome.
If I add leaves and twigs and soil and water, then my seeds will not grow.
Materials:
A bottle
Leaves
Crabapples
Soil
Water
Twigs
Procedures:
1. Put items from nature in the bottle.
2. Add water into the bottle.
3. Put the seed in the bottle.
4. Allow the bottle to sit for a while.
5. Observe.
Data & Observations:
I noticed that our environment got very soggy probably because of the amount of water
we put in there. I also noticed that the seed did not grow. Everything else in the bottle
remained unchanged.
Analyze & Conclude:
1. On which abiotic factor did you focus? Why?
We focused on the soil and water because those are two major factors that plants
need to grow.
2. Did this abiotic factor seem to have a significant impact on the dependent variable
in your simulated ecosystem? Explain.
No, the seed did not grow so we must have added to much water, or there was not
enough sunlight.
3. Describe the control in your experiment. What was held constant in the control?
Why was it set up that way? There was no control in my experiment.
4. How does your experiment relate to biomes and abiotic factors in nature?
There were many different plants and rocks so we had an area much like the biomes in
nature.
5. What are some possible sources of error in your experiment?
Some possible sources of error could have been when we added more water after 2 days
of it sitting there.
6. Exchange your procedure and data with another group in your class. What do
their data show about the biome they chose to simulate? What conclusions can
you draw about the abiotic factors in a biome? They chose to simulate a biome
much like ours. There seed did not grow so I think that if there are many abiotic
factors in a biome new plants cannot grow as well.
7. What are the limitations of the design of this experiment? Are there additional
factors at work? A limitation is the space we had to do it in. A real biome is much
larger than the water bottle we simulated it in. There are many factors at work
including what other people could have done to the bottle and how much light it
got when the lights were shut of.
Write and Discuss
Write a short paragraph describing your findings and indicating whether or not they
support your hypothesis. Discuss any questions your results have raised.
1. Describe the rainfall pattern and abiotic factors that make up the biome you live
in. How do these factors impact the plants, animals, and agriculture in your area?
There is a lot of dirt in the biome I live in. There are also mountains and rocks. There is
usually an average amount of rain. These factors impact the plants around here in many
ways. The grasslands usually look yellow instead of green. Also, this makes the plants
less in number for the animals to eat which means there will not be enough healthy cattle
to support the agriculture needs.
2. If you were to maintain your biomes in the classroom or at home, what abiotic
factors would you change from your original model? Make a prediction about
what you would observe under the new conditions.
I would make the area more spread out and maybe take out some of the dead twigs and
add some rocks to make the environment more realistic. I would also add less water. I
think with the spread out area the plant would have room to grow so it would have a
higher chance of growing. Also, the more realistic environment would help the plant
grow also so I would bet the plant would grow under these conditions.