Procedure 

HomeIntroductionSample ResultsTroubleshootingBibliographyContactsAcknowlegements

1. First, you will need to have 30 plastic bags and label 15 of them postive control and the other 15 for the experimental.

 
 

2. Get 12 flags for the edges of the plots and

then 15 more for where the samples will be taken from. 

   
   

3.Get 6 liter bottles and fill them with water.

4. Take a soil extractor as  well as mallet and a trowel if needed.

   
   

5. Go outside and make 3 plots each 1/2 a meter. Make sure that the plots are relatively close to each other.

6. Place 1 flag  on the corner of each of the 3 plots.

   
   

7. Clear all of the plots so that a clear surface will be made.  take 5 samples from each plot. One from each corner and another one from the middle of the plot. (When the extractor is placed in the ground, it should reach the 2nd line before it is pulled out.

   

8. Put each soil sample in the corresponding bag. For example you would put the first sample in the bag labeled "sample 1 plot 1 postive control."

9. Every time that soil is extracted, wash off and thoroghly dry the extractor so that soil would not be mixed together and it would be eaiser to get into the bags.

   
   

10. Now that the positive control samples have been extracted, take two liters of water and pour slowly, allowing the soil to absorb the water, into plot 2.

11. Then add 4 liters of water to plot 3, pouring in the same manner as indicated in step 10.

12. Label 15 petri dishes the same way as the plastic bags were. ex: "Plot 1 Sample 1 Positive Control"

   
   

13.Put each sample in its proper dish.

   
   

14.For this protozoa and bacteria extraction and Serial Dillution portion of this experiment, this protocol was used: ../../ESSREProtocols.htm

15.Also Test the soil for Nitrate, Nitrite, and Amonia and the testing kit that was used was the Lamotte STH-14 Soil Testing Kit. http://www.lamotte.com/