Saturday, May 18, 2013

Compost Tea!

You probably already know how much I love tea. And you can probably guess how found I am of compost.

Check out this article about what compost tea can do for soil! 

"Compost tea is useful much like yogurt is to the human intestinal track in which helpful microbial colonies make nutrients available and support the immune system.
In soil, aerobic bacteria and mycorrhizae (helpful fungus) produce antibiotics and enzymes that prevent disease agents from taking hold. Plant foliage can also be colonized by these microbes, preventing pathogenic infection.
Compost tea works with microbes by multiplying and concentrating the actual numbers found in the relatively small amount of compost used. Rather than force feeding plants with soluble chemical salts such as nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium, or N-P-K, compost tea feeds the soil with countless microbes that work symbiotically with plants, providing bio-available nutrients from otherwise insoluble minerals. The benefits of using compost tea include reduced water and fertilizer requirements, increased root and foliar growth, and improves soil tilth, porosity and nutrient-holding capacity."

The article is complete with instructions!

"During the brewing process, microbes found in the compost will use the oxygen, humic acid, sugar and minerals as a food source to rapidly reproduce. The tea will then contain numbers of microbes several orders of magnitude over what the compost originally supported. Good compost tea may have up to 100 trillion bacteria per 1 milliliter of solution." 

Friday, May 3, 2013

Oregon's State Soil!

INTRODUCING THE JORY SOIL! 

The Oregon state soil is called Jory. The Jory soil series consists of very deep, well-drained soils that formed in colluvium (unconsolidated sediments that have been deposited at the base of hillslopes by either rain wash, sheet wash, and slow continuous downslope creep). The sediments are weathered and eroded from basaltic igneous rock. These soils are in the foothills surrounding the Willamette Valley.

Jory soils generally support forest vegetation, dominantly Douglas fir and Oregon white oak. They are very productive forest soils. Many areas have been cleared and are used for agricultural crops including: Christmas trees, various berries, hazelnuts, sweet corn, wheat, and many varieties of grass seed.

The Soil Profile is described as:
Surface layer (duff): organic material 
Top Soil layer: dark reddish brown silty clay loam 
Subsoil - upper: dark reddish brown clay 
Subsoil - lower: red clay.

Monday, April 29, 2013

When did tectonic plates start moving?

The most exciting thing about this article is that I started reading it and then realized THAT I KNOW THE PERSON WHO DID THIS RESEARCH!! Rita is a graduate student at BU who I have worked with, and gone camping with, she was my TA for Mineralogy(!).

"Volcanic rocks found in the south Pacific spent at least 2.45 billion years on a journey into Earth's interior – and back again.

The finding could help narrow down when our planet's massive tectonic plates first started jostling with each other, which may have provided a crucial backdrop for life's early evolution.
About 20 million years ago, volcanic eruptions spewed out magma that cooled and solidified to form the basaltic rocks of Mangaia, one of the Cook Islands. There is some evidence that the eruptions also brought up remnants of ancient oceanic crust, which had been forced deep into the mantle long ago. This happens when one tectonic plate is pushed down underneath another – a process called subduction.
To work out the age of that recycled ancient crust, Rita Cabral of Boston University and her colleagues analysed the sulphur isotopes in Mangaia's basalt rocks...
Earth is the only planet in our solar system that has active plate tectonics – and the only place we know of that harbours life. "Many researchers think that the features associated with plate tectonics, such as hydrothermal vents, provided the nutrients and surfaces for the first life to form," says Cabral.
There is little consensus about when plate tectonics began, though. Rocks found in Greenland in 2007 suggest hydrothermal vents were present 3.8 billion years ago, just before life is thought to have originated. But it isn't clear when other crucial features of plate tectonics – particularly subduction – began."
For a more thorough discussion of this topic, specifically When did tectonic plates form? Check out this thorough and accessible review of the matter!

Sunday, April 28, 2013

Update: New Uses for Sodium Bicarbonate and Acetic Acid!

I returned from week three of outdoor school and washed my considerably greasy hair with Sodium Bicarbonate. Rinsed most of it out and then rinsed with diluted apple cider vinegar. I was actually a little disappointed that there was not more fizz. I was thinking the fizzing might make my hair feel more clean.

 I washed my hair very first so the vinegar would have lots of time to rinse out. I still have some concerns that I smell a little acidic. My hair however seems as clean as it usually does.

Maybe I need to change my favorite conservation method on the staff resume to "Not using Shampoo"

I am also wondering if diluting the vinegar we do chemical weathering with is a viable option. It could reduce some of the "Ugh my hands smell bad now" phenomenon we see with 6th graders. Perhaps I will have to test this out during week 4!

Volcanoes and Ice Ages I

Here is an article about using ice to examine the ends of ice ages. Ice ages are periods of time where the global temperature is lower and the continental ice sheets on the earth are expanding. The Earth does not always have ice present on its surface, these periods of time are called interglacial periods. By this definition, we are still in the ice age that began 2.6 million years ago at the start of the Pleistocene epoch, because the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets still exist.

This article talks about what must have started the beginning of the end of our current ice age. 

"Once the cores have been processed in Denver, each university lab will get its slice of the ice for analysis, which will likely take a year, Cole-Dai said. His SDSU team will work on a section of ice from 17,500 years ago that offers clues as to why Earth began to emerge from the Ice Age.
At that point in history, Cole-Dai said, "something big happened -- a large volcanic eruption or a number of them." Others speculate that it might have been an object from outer space that struck Earth."

"By measuring the kinds and quantities of chemicals in the ice cores and determining how those change over time, scientists can study the events that lead to global climate change,"

Sediments and Wetlands

Check out this article about the importance of catastrophic events. Marshes are low lying areas near the coast and as sea level rises marsh habitat is shrinking. The results of this study shed light on how floods impact wetlands, and how these effects might be harnessed to purposefully rebuild Louisiana's wetlands, which are sinking from compaction and growing smaller as sea level rises.

"The marshes may be able to maintain their surface area or height above sea level if they receive significant sediment, either from floods or hurricanes or normal fluvial processes," Horton said. "Ours is the only empirical study to obtain an estimate of how much sediment is deposited by a large-scale flood on the Mississippi."


Sunday, April 21, 2013

New Uses for Sodium Bicarbonate and Acetic Acid!

This is not just for showing how chemical weathering occurs!

Read about how you can use baking soda and vinegar to replace your shampoo! Waste reduction AND better hair!

"So, let’s review: quitting shampoo will clear up your complexion and make your hair look awesome, plus it will save you time and money. Also it’s better for the environment to use fewer plastic bottles and wash less poison down the drain. And there’s I guess a tiny chance it will also save you from some combination of cancer and let’s go with...epilepsy. Ready to give it a try?"

"Use the baking soda and vinegar in place of shampoo and conditioner for at least two weeks. I promise, your head will not become a science-fair volcano."

I am trying it! I may let you know how it works!