Potassium+soil+testing

Matthew Charles Cesar Gonzalez
 * UEI Project**

Science Question- Would there be more potassium nutrients in moist soil or dry soil? Hypothesis- My partner and i believe that moist soil will have more potassium nutrients than dry soil. Introduction- The first thing that my partner and i did was gather soil samples from the football field(dry area) and then soil samples from the pond near the school(moist). Materials- The materials that my partner and i used was the soil testing kit, data table, small shovel, clear cups, and testing tubes. Procedure- First we obtained the soil samples needed to do the experiment. Then we took the samples and put them into the test tube and filled it with potassium extracting solution. Then we added 20 drops of postassium indicator into each test tube and shook it for 1mins. then we let the soil settle. afterwards we added potassium indicator to each tube and then mixed it until a purplish color appeared. then we added 20 drops of potassium test solution. Results- the results of the experiment came back as both the soil samples would have the same amount of potassium nutrients which was 120 pounds per acre. Conclusion- As the results proved our hypothesis is wrong and found out that there will be equal amounts of potassium nutrients in dry soil as there are moist soil. Extra Work- My partner and I also found out that there will be more pH in moist soil then there is dry soil by using the pH indicator and moist soil came up as 7.0 and the dry soil came up as 6.0 in pH levels. so even though Dry soil and moist soil have the same potassium nutrient levels it might be best to use moist soil.