Tag - Gardening

Homeschooling Mom Gives a Twist to Do Not Open Bottle Experiment

Leah is a homeschooling mom of six. She blogs about her experiences as a homeschooling mom on her blog, Almost Unschoolers. On the blog, she has a feature called “Sunday Science.”

She recently posted about making a Do Not Open Bottle but using it in the garden. I love it when someone expands upon an experiment and makes it their own. If you are unfamiliar with the Do Not Open Bottle experiment, it is a lesson in air pressure, gravity and surface tension.

Start with an empty soda bottle, poke holes around it near the bottom. Set the bottle in the sink and fill it up about half way. It’s a little tricky, because some of the water will leak out the holes. Replace the cap on the top and lift the bottle. If the cap is tightly sealed, the water will stop leaking from the holes. When you twist the cap and allow air to rush into the bottle, the water will once again
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Putting Water Jelly Crytals to the Test

Over the years we’ve sold tons… literally… of Water Jelly Crystals to customers around the world eager to take advantage of the crystals’ water-saving properties in their gardens.  So, it only made sense that when we took on our own landscaping project that we put these superabsorbing polymers to the test.

When the big day came, you could here me reminding our landscaper… maybe more than once… to get a good handful of hydrated crystals in the holes before adding the plants.  Maybe he thought we were a little crazy, but our plants look beautiful and we suspect they will use a lot less water than normal, which is especially important in the arid climate here in Colorado.  Thanks to a lot of hard work, and a total of six GALLONS (nearly 23 liters) of Water Jelly Crystals, the Spangler Science offices are looking better than ever.