8th Grade Science Project Help?

[Tony P]

My daughter needs to come up with an 8th grade science project & she wants something that has do with hunting or fishing. Any ideas?

Thanks,
Tony

[Ralph]

I won a science fair in the 7th grade by lining up four aquariums and placed fertile salmon eggs (from Moccasin Hatchery) into the proper sized gravel. Each tank had an under gravel filter and two aerators. Left two at room temp, chilled the others, then poured silt over the top of the gravel in a cold and a warm tank. My hypothesis was that the cold clean tank would have the highest survival rate. Even went on to predict the other 3 tanks would fail to hatch. The silted warm tank hatched first and had the highest survival. Oh well.

[JohnS]

The only problem with that experiment is that you're testing two variables. Choose one of the two variables (clean/silted or cold/warm) and have 2 tanks for each condition of the variable. For example, 2 clean tanks and 2 silted tanks. I would suggest to use the survival as a measure of success rather than on set of birth. Other than water condition, make sure all other variables are same: type of water, bottom condition, type of eggs, etc.

Best of luck. Make sure your child follows the scientific method

[ptychocheilus]

Stick with inverts. Most science fairs now require crazy paperwork and/or an extensive review process for use of vertebrate animals (if they even allow it at all!), but you could probably get away with using snails or aquatic insects or Corbicula and likely get similar results.

Note that schools don't have to submit IACUC forms to serve fish stix (probably because there's almost no fish in those stix!).

Damn bunny huggers take all the fun out of science!

[jersey]

just an idea, how algae impacts a body of water or how fertilizer promote algae growth. trying to think small demo' stuff. there is a study going on now out of the Davis lab in Bodega Bay concerning surf perch, I know they were planning on heading south to Monterrey too...good luck

[gonefirefighting]

my daughter did hers as a volunteer at the nimbus hatchery. they took her all over the place counting, netting, shocking, collections. she ended up using all the data to produce a annual forecast for species counts in the local waters. made it all into a video.

she also did one on arrow penetration at different yardages, that was pretty fun for her

the one she wants to do next year is migration/roaming patterns of elk herds before and after hunting season using trail cameras....luckily I have alot of them, she is going to map them using google