RDC Ecology Columns: April 2013

1. Yes, we all believe that our Eco-Column was a good success. Despite our plant dying, everything else seemed to be working very nicely. Maggots were formed, decomposing away everything in our Decomposition Zone. Our earthworms lasted for a good while, until eventually they died, allowing more dead matter to decompose. In the end, our Eco-Column even managed to become self-sustaining, as its own plant life began to form! I really believe that it was a true success, as we had a great time building it, observing it, blogging about it, and just learning about Ecology in the process. It really was a true success.

2. Redwald- I learned an unbelievable amount about Ecology in the past term. I've learned how abiotic, and biotic factors interact with one another, and ways to make an Eco-System self-sustaining. Just blogging about our findings taught me a lot about how and why things happened in our Eco-Column. I really have increased my understanding of Ecology.
Calven- I really was interested in Ecology from the start, and my understand of the topic has grown every time we wrote a new blog post. I've now begun to grasp the concept of all the biotic, and abiotic factors working together in an Eco-System. I think the reason why I've learned and understood so much about Ecology, because it was a fun and interesting way to learn.
Daniel- At the start of the first term, when we were introduced to this 'project', I really did struggle to understand the whole 'Ecology' thing. I'll be honest, it sure did take a while, but eventually I managed to take hold of the information I needed to know when blogging. Red and Calven really helped me along the way, teaching me, and helping me understand how, and why things happen in the Eco-System, and our Eco-Column. So, after a hard term's work, I can really say that my understand of Ecology has really been improved.

3. Redwald- I really believe that our group worked really well together. Everybody contributed an even amount, and whenever one of us struggled to understand a task, the other two members would help him get the knowledge he required. We worked hard, and efficiently, sticking to our tasks until they were done.
Calven- I believe our blog does show what we've learned about Ecology, and about our very own Eco-Column. It is a rather accurate reflection of what we have learned, we believe our Blog was well made, and almost all the information about our Eco-Column was put up on there. Just working on the posts taught me so very much, increasing my fascination for the subject.
Daniel- To start off, we all worked together in building the Eco-Column. Building it together during Open Periods, and on weekends. We eventually finished this, and filled it together one afternoon after our cricket practice. We then began posts on our blog, which we all worked well on. Redwald was our blog master, who did all the posting. However, Calven and I did write many posts, we just ran them through Red as his English is quite strong, and we believed that it would be rather nice should our English be grammatically correct! Calven was our Photographer, he took the pictures of our Eco-Column and sent them on to whoever needed them for a post. We all took our work up with a smile on our face, and got it done. Together as a team, we worked superbly, and I hope that all our great teamwork results in a nice overall mark.

1. Our Predictions
Before the holidays, we were asked to make various predictions about our Eco-Column. Considering our Eco-Columns state before the holidays, we really didn't think there could be much change. The plant was all but dead, and the only visible lifeforms were some fruit fly maggots, and fruit flies themselves. However, the the task was to make predictions- and so, we did:

In our Terra Zone, our plant was barely alive, but there were some remnants of green in it- showing that there was some life. We predicted that after the holidays, our plant would be dead. There would be no colour in it's leaves, and it would be dried up.
The water, in our Aqua Zone, was almost as stagnant as possible, so we didn't believe there would be any change in there. To add, we realized that the water levels would not rise, due to our pipe that releases water, and by the fact that there would be extremely limited watering (if any!) during the holidays. Therefore, our prediction was that after the holidays, there would be no visible change to the Aqua Zone in our Eco-Column.
In the decomposition zone, we noticed maggots along the rims of the Coke bottles. And everything inside it had already been decomposed. Therefore, we predicted that their would be no change in the content of our Decomposition Zone, as we believed everything decomposable, has already been decomposed. Due to this, we also predicted that all our maggots would die.

2. What we Thought about our Predictions

Now that the holidays (the three week period) are completed, the next task is to comment on the accuracy of our predictions, and explain some reasons for why this could have happened. My overall all impression on my predictions was that they were fairly accurate. However, we all noticed some things that we hadn't predicted.

We predicted the happenings to our Terra Zone almost perfectly. Our plant, if it wasn't before the three week period, was now truly dead. The leaves were dry, crumbling to the touch, and had no signs of green colour on them, and the leaves had actually begun to decompose and become part of our soil. Reasons for this, could be due to the lack of lighting in the classroom during the period, and by the fact that no water was given to our plant for those three weeks. I would like to also add to the list of reasons, the fact that the plant was more or less dead before the holidays.
Once again, we found our predictions (for our Aqua Zone) were fairly accurate. The water level stayed constant, due to our pipe releasing water, and due to it not being watered once during the three week period. The water itself didn't change too much, however, the water became a lighter brown over the three weeks, with the bottom of the water turning a tad green. This would be due to the lack of water motion over the holidays, creating a green 'scum' at the bottom of the liquid. Another thing I never stated in our predictions was, that fact that our water would stink horrifically! Which it did...
Our prediction for the Decomposition Zone was fairly inaccurate, we noticed that our content remaining hadn't changed dramatically. However, we found the maggots were still alive and were even bigger than before. We found this rather peculiar, and realized that our initial observation was incorrect- there were in fact decomposable things in our Decomposition Zone for the maggots to feed. Contrary to what we believed. We also never predicted an almost blatantly obvious thing- mould growth. In our Decomposition Zone, we observed moss forming at the base of our cotton. This, would occur due to the fact that water had made its way through the cotton, leaving it damp and dark (due to the lack of lighting in the room), which are both ideal for growing mould.

3. Before and Afters:

As a back up for the previous answer- here are our 'before and after' photos for each group.

Terra Zone: