Dirtierbeansdraft
This topic submitted by Bryan GLosik, Nick Delphia (
GLosikbn@muohio.edu ) on 10/9/03 .
Dirtier Beans: an exploration of the effect of soil composition and nutrient content on the growth of bean plants
Bryan Glosik and Nick Delphia
INTRODUCTION
The main focus and purpose of this experiment is to observe a large number of bean plants growing in a variety of soils. (metro-mix, topsoil, sandy soil, and clay) There will also be fertilizer added to half of each soil sample. We will look at which soils allow the greatest growth for the bean plants and look at whether or not the fertilizer has a significant affect on the bean growth.
Our hypotheses are that the beans will grow best in the topsoil samples and plants will fare better in soil that is fertilized as compared to plants in the same soil type without fertilizer. We think that the topsoil will yield the best plant growth due to the rich nutrient value found in natural topsoil. Other researchers have found that the numbers of beneficial microorganisms that contribute to plant growth "were higher in soils amended with composted plant materials in experiment station plots" (L. R Bulluck III et al 157).
We believe that the beans will have a difficult time growing in the clay due to the lack of air circulation getting to the roots to stimulate growth (Bouma and Bryla 215). It will also make it hard for water to get to the seed because of the density and poor water retention properties of the clay. We think that the water will sit on top of the clay or just flow around it and drain out the bottom of the flat and that therefore the been plants in the clay may not get sufficient water. It is possible that the clay will dry out and become too hard for the beans to grow in. We hope that we will find out which one of our soils will be best for the growth of beans.
We find this subject to be interesting due to personal past experiences. Nick grew up in Columbus, a city impossible to drive out of without being exposed to large amounts of agricultural land. Nick's father has also farmed a plot of land in a city owned garden for as long as Nick remembers. Nick has always been fascinated by growing plants since watching and helping his dad farm as a child.
Bryan is from northern Ohio, which is probably even more loaded with farmland than the areas surrounding Columbus. Bryan did an internship where he assisted in a USDA survey and counted tillage in bean fields. e was helping with research about soil quality and how it related to tilling the soil.RELEVANCE
Our research project ties into a large-scale issue that effects the entire world. Human beings could not exist as they do today without farming. Legumes are an important crop across the earth. Chances are, that on any given day you could very likely end up eating legumes. Legumes are the basic food staple for much of the world. Beans are "grown extensively in all major continental areas" (Graham & Ranalli 131). Many people depend on beans for survival. "Common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris) is the most important food legume on earth, providing scarce nutrients to many people in developing countries" (Fisher et al 63).
Because legumes are such an important food source for so much of the world, it is important to consider what may be affecting farmerÕs ability to produce legumes. The web site http://www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/crops/00539.html says "Legumes, such as dry beans, fix a portion of their total nitrogen from the atmosphere thus nitrogen fertilizers usually are not needed" The same web-site says that"Phosphorus often is the most limiting nutrient for dry beans". Fisher, Eissenstat and Lynch found that in a "sand culture", "the lowest phosphorus treatment induced severe deficiency, at the lower limit of what might be called agricultural production" (Fisher et al 69). Farmers need to use a fertilizer that is rich in phosphorus if they want their bean crops to be able to flourish.
Water can also play an obvious part in determining how well bean plants fare in a given environment. Sangakkara, Frehner, and Noseberger write that "legumes are grown in a wide range of environments, and water stress is considered the principal environmental factor limiting growth and yield" (Sangakkara et al 73). Other researchers also found that "lack of moisture and low soil fertility" limit "bean production" (Boutra & Sanders 229).
Erosion is an important problem that farmers must face. As the good top-soil erodes away, farmers may be forced to use lower quality soils (like sand or clay). There has been much research on soil erosion and its effect on agriculture, but not enough. R. Evans writes "There is a need for continuing (as well as new) projects to monitor erosion in the field" (Evans 205). Erosion affects farmers everywhere. Farmers as far away as Kenya and Tanzania have to struggle against erosion (www.geo.su.se/naturgeo/tropik/low_abstracts.htm).
There is a huge financial commitment by governments to help their farmers. Farmers often choose land on a flood plain for their crops because it is more fertile. "A logical result of farming in the floodplains was that owners who had struggled to clear these highly productive lands wanted to protect them from flood waters" (http://edc.usgs.gov/sast/www/ch_8sast.htm)
To limit the amount of soil lost to erosion, many farmers use a process called no-till farming. To add nitrogen to the soil, the crops that are planted are switched with beans every now and then so that the beans can add nitrogen to the soil through a process called nitrogen fixation. "N contribution by root nodules is often viewed as the major role of symbiotic legumes in cropping systems" (Dakora 39-40).
Legumes are a very interesting crop because of their nitrogen fixing capabilities, which are dependant in part on the nutrient content of the soil (Leidi & Rodriguez-Navarro 337). This is a process that requires oxygen in the soil around the roots. The soils that we are using have a varying degree of porosity. Some researchers have stated that there is "little understanding how soil texture and water content may affect these estimates [of root and soil respiration]"(Bouma & Bryla 215). Other researchers have found that "aeration characteristics were strongly influenced by the texture and bulk density" of the soils they used (Rasiah and Kay 92)
The web site http://www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/crops/00539.html says "Legumes, such as dry beans, fix a portion of their total nitrogen from the atmosphere thus nitrogen fertilizers usually are not needed" The same web-site says that"Phosphorus often is the most limiting nutrient for dry beans"METHODS/EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN
Our experimental design and method is a very simple and clear plan. We will be using four soil types in this experiment. Half of the bean plants in each soil type will be fertilized while the other half will be unfertilized.
We will grow our plants in the Boyd greenhouse. The greenhouse has a fertilized waterline that we will use on our fertilized plants. The greenhouse is heated, so the plants will be in a stable environment that is supportive of plant growth.
The pre-made mixture of fertilizer that we will use contains a 20:10:20 ratio (nitrogen: phosphorus: potash). The water in the fertilizer solution is tap water that has been softened with a phosphate-based water softener (plants wouldnÕt respond well to the traditional salt-based softeners). To eliminate the possibility that results may be skewed from differences in the plain water, and the water in the fertilizer solution, we will use the same phosphate-softened water that is used in the fertilizer solution as our plain water.
For our control soil, we will use metro-mix 350. Metro-mix 350 is designed specifically for growing plants. Our other test soils will be natural topsoil from Western Woods, clay from Pfeiffer Park, and sandy soil from Pfeiffer Park. Similar studies have been done by other researchers (Reidell, Beck et al 316). We will have one flat for each type of soil. There will be 24 plants per flat, half of which will be watered with the fertilized mixture while the other half will be watered with plain water.
Each row of the plants will be labeled with a letter in the alphabet. Each plant will be labeled individually by the row letter and however many over from the left it is. (ie. B1, B2, B3, B4ÉÉ) Plant numbers 1-3 in each of the rows will be the non-fertilized plants and plants 4-6 will be marked with an additional F for fertilized.
When we are collecting data, there are certain things we will be looking for. We will write down for each plant the plant number, soil type, fertilized or unfertilized, height, number of leaves, number of stems off of the stalk, number of buds and the quantity of water per flat. Also, every Monday, we will take a photograph of the plants with a digital camera. For seven weeks we will take this data. At the end of the seven weeks we will have the class measure the biomass of all the bean plants. This method of measuring the dry weight of plants is not new. Dracup and Kirby developed an experiment in which they measured the dry weight of lupins in Australia (Dracup, Kirby, p. 211).
Once we have all of our data, we will compare the growth and yield of plants from one soil with those of the same soil that were fertilized. This will assess the effect of fertilizer on plant growth. For our analyses, we will make histograms with two sets of bars that compare growth with and without fertilizers and another set of graphs that compares the numbers of stems, leaves, and buds on plants with fertilizers to those from plants without fertilizers.
We will compare these same characteristics between plants in different soils to assess how the soils affect plant growth. We will compare the growth and yield of plants in the unfertilized soils to each other and make the same comparisons between the plants in the fertilized soils. The comparisons will be made among each type of fertilized soil, and again among each type of unfertilized soil. We will use a t-test to analyze the statistical validity of any differences found between fertilized and unfertilized. For comparisons between the different soils we will most likely use an ANOVA test, and a post hoc test. Histograms may be used to compare the growth and yield of plants from different soils. Our Data Sheet
RESEARCH TIMELINE
Week of 10-7: plant beans on the sixth. Week of 10-14: observe plants, water, measure/photograph on Monday 10-13. Week of 10-21: observe plants, water, measure/photograph on Monday 10-20. Week of 10-28: observe plants, water, measure/photograph on Monday 10-28. Week of 11-4: observe plants, water, measure/photograph on Monday 11-3. Week of 11-11: observe plants, water, measure/photograph on Monday 11-10. Week of 11-18: observe plants, water, measure/photograph on Monday 11-17. Week of 11-25: take final measurements and uproot each plant. Dry plants out to prepare for final mass measurement. Week of 12-2: discovery lab 5. Our teaching day. Have the class break up into groups and take mass measurements of each plant for us. Week of 12-9: finish up work, turn in final report.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Bouma, Tjeerd J. & David R. Bryla. 2000. "On the assessment of root and soil respiration for soils of different textures: interactions with soil moisture contents and soil CO2 concentrations". Plant and Soil 227: 215-221.This article discusses the necessity for soil respiration in order for the plant to survive. One of our soil types is clay from the creek. We think that this will not allow the been roots to get enough oxygen
Boutraa, T. & F. E. Sanders. 2001. "Effects of Interactions of Moisture Regime and Nutrient Addition on Nodulation and Carbon Partitioning in Two Cultivars of Bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.)" J. Agronomy & Crop Science. vol. 186: 229-337.
This article describes the major limiting factors on bean growth, which is what we are concerned with as well.
Bulluck III, L. R., M. Brosius, G. K. Evanylo & J. B. Ristaino. 2002. "Organic and synthetic fertility amenments influence soil microbial, physical and chemical properties on organic and conventional farms." Applied Soil Ecology. vol. 19: 147-160.
This article describes an experiment in which the bean plants grew better in soils that had natural decomposed materials in them than they did in regular unfertilized soils. This helped us in our prediction.
Dacrup, Miles & E. J. M. Kirby. "Pod and seed growth and development of narrow-leafed lupin in a water limited mediterranean-type environment". Field Crops Research, vol. 48: 209-222.
This article discusses factors that contribute to legume development. We chose to use it because we are concerned with the development of our own legume plants.
Dakora, Felix D. 2002."Defining new roles for plant and rhizobial molecules in sole and mixed plant cultures involving symbiotic legumes". New Phytologist. vol 158: 39-49.
This article discusses properties of soil that can lead to increased grain yields of legume plants. We selected this article because it is relevant to what we are doing.
Evans, R. 2002. "An alternative way to assess water erosion of cultivated land Ð field-based measurements: and analysis of some results." Applied Geography. Vol. 22: 187-208.
We chose this artical because it discusses the importance of dealing with erosion, which we address in our relevance section.
Fisher, C. T., David M. Eissenstat & Jonathan P. Lynch. 2002. "Lack of evidence for programmed root senescence in common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris) growth at different levels of phosphorus supply."New Phytologist. vol. 153: 63-71.
This article discusses the importance of beans as a staple food crop for the world, and describes how the growth of beans was affected when the nutrient levels in the soil were changed.
Graham, P. H. & P. Ranalli. 1997. "Common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.)" Field Crops Research. vol. 53: 131-146.
This article discusses the basic factors that go into bean production, including the key limiting factors of soil.
Leidi, E. O. & D. N. Rodriguez-Navarro. 2000. "Nitrogen and phosphorus availability limit N2 fixation in bean." New Phytologist. vol. 147: 337-346.
This article discusses the affect of nutrient availabilty on the nitrogen fixation capabilities of bean plants. This ties into the larger issue that our project relates to.
Rasiah, V. & B. D. Kay. 1998. "Legume N mineralization: effect of aeration and size distribution of water-filled pores." Soil Biology & Biochemistry. vol 30: 89-96.
This article discusses the importance of the pores in the soil, and their effect on the growth of legumes.
Ridell, Walter E., Dwayne L. Beck, and Thomas E. Schumacher. 2000. "Corn Response to Fertilizer placement Treatments in an Irrigated No-Till System". Agronomy Journal, vol. 92: 316-320.
We chose this article because it addresses the use of fertilizers on legumes. This is what we are doing in our experiment, so it made sense that weÕd want this article for a reference.
Sangakkara, U. R., M. Frehner, & J. Nosberger. "Influence of Soil Moisture and Fertilizer Potassium on the Vegetative Growth of Mungbean (Vigna radiata L. Wilczek) and Cowpea (Vigna unguiculata L.Walp)Ó. Journal of Agronomy and Crop Science, vol. 186: 73-81.
This artical discusses the effect of water and fertilizer on bean plants. Since this is exactly what we are doing with our experiment, we chose to use this artical.
WEB SOURCESLevees
we selected this site because it talks about the agricultural and erosional qualities of floodplains.
Fertilizing Dry Beans
we selected this site because it talks about how to properly fertilize beans
Erosion
This site explains the significance of erosion in other parts of the world, mainly Africa
Using Farmers' knowledge
This site talks about the basic know-how that farmers can contribute to someone trying to learn how to grow crops
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