Growing Crystals

Ever since she was a little girl your Aunt Tiffani has loved sparkly things, especially crystals.  This week I thought I would share a project with crystals that we have done in school. You will need your parents to help you because there are some things that you will need an adult to help you in the process. There are many possibilities for this project. You could make Christmas ornaments. You could make window decorations. Today I want to show you how to make crystal geodes. A geode is a natural occurring hollow stone that sometimes contains crystals. They can be a rainbow of different colors. These geodes are going to be made from egg shells. This is only one way to do it. If you look online, you can find many other creative ideas for using the crystals.

To do this project you will need to find these things:

·       1 box of 20 Mule Team Borax Laundry Soap

·       A medium size sauce pan.

·       1 gallon of distilled, R/O, or bottled water. (tap watter will also work, but not as well)

·       Several ½ egg shells (Clean them out as much as you can.)

·       A Spoon to stir

·       A plastic cup to dip water out.

·       Food coloring if you want different colored crystals

·       Optional: colored pipe cleaners

Directions:

1. Fill the sauce pan 2/3 – 3/4 full of water.

2. Have an adult heat it on the stove. It doesn’t have to get to boiling, but the warmer the better.

3. Slowly stir in the borax powder. Eventually, you will rach a point where no more will dissolve. This is called a saturated solution.

4. Let it cool until it is still warm but won’t burn little fingers.

5. Dip some out into one of the cups and add several drops of food coloring. You want it pretty dark.

6. Set the egg shells in an old egg carton so they look like little cups.

7. Fill each one with the colored solution.

As it cools, you will start to see crystal forming. If you want more crystals after they stop growing, you can pour out the solution (save it!) and add more of the fresh warm solution. You can even drop the food coloring right onto the crystals and let it dry to make the colors more vivid.

Another fun thing to do is to make shapes (stars crosses, etc.) out of pipe cleaners and put them in a cup. Pour in enough warm solution to cover them and you will soon have sparkly Christmas or Easter ornaments. They also look good in a sunny window!

 

 Note:

* Borax can be a skin and eye irritant. You may want the little ones to wear gloves. Food gloves work fine.

** Be sure the no little ones try to eat the crystals. They are not really poisonous except in large amounts, but they will make you sick!

More Ideas

  https://www.instructables.com/How-to-Grow-Borax-Crystals/

Ooo...Tardigrades!

 

This week I want to tell you about another crazy little animal. They are microscopic, only composed of around 1000 cells (you have trillions of cells in you) and are almost indestructible. That means they are really hard to kill. They can form a hard shell around themselves and go into a really deep sleep. They can withstand bitter cold freezing temperatures, stay dried out of years, and even survive extreme pressure or the vacuum of space for a while and still come “back to life” when you add water! They like to live in moss and lichen (tiny plants that grow in moist places). Because of this, many people call them “moss piglets”. There might even be some on your roof or in your rain gutters! There are many varieties all around the world, even in the ocean.

The have a mouth like a straw and drink the juices out of plants or even tiny animals. Tardigrades have no lungs, clear blood, two eyespots, and lay eggs. They can live from a few months to over 2 years but can rest for years in a dried out condition. All they need is water to wake up and start crawling around again. Here is a video of one that Papaw found in some water that a student brought from their pond.

If you have a microscope, you might be able to find one by taking moss and adding a few drops of water. After a while you can put the water on a slide and look for water bears. They are kind of hard to see so it might take several tries.

Here’s a coloring page and a link to find out more! 

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/invertebrates/facts/tardigrades-water-bears

Later!

Love, Papaw

You Sure Axolotl Questions!

Have you ever heard of an axolotl? You may have just thought they were a cute storybook animal, but they really do exist! And boy are they cute. Axolotls are a type of salamander. Salamanders are amphibians like frogs and toads, which means they have moist skin and start their lives in water. Most salamanders hatch as eggs in ponds or streams. They spend time as a larva with gills that are outside their body. When they final grow into adults, the gills disappear and they crawl out on land to spend the rest of their lives hiding in moist places looking for bugs, worms and other insects to eat.

Axolotls are salamanders that never leave the water. They keep their gills for their whole life. Axolotls are originally from a few ponds around Mexico City, Mexico. There are very few living in the wild now, so they are considered endangered. Many people around the world like to keep them as pets. Many zoos and colleges have groups of axolotls.

They come in several different colors. They may be tan, brown or even pink. The pink ones are called albinos. Axolotls in the wild are grey-brown in color. Axolotls like to eat crustaceans, worms, insects, and even small fish. Axolotls can live for live for 10-15 years and can grow to 30 cm (12 inches).

Papaw doesn’t have any axolotls right now. They need to be kept pretty cold, almost like in your refrigerator! I would have to have an aquarium with a device called a chiller to keep them cold. I asked Meema if I could keep one in our refrigerator, but she said no because he might eat all the bacon. Nope, he can't have my bacon! 

If you would like to learn more about axolotls here are some sites to check out. 

https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/axolotls-amphibians-that-never-grow-up.html

https://animals.sandiegozoo.org/animals/axolotl

Axolotl Song

Axolotl Coloring Pages

     

See Ya Next Week!

Love, Papaw

Why is Water Called H2O?

Water is important. You need to drink some every day. We use it to wash things like our clothes, our cars, and our faces. We use it to cook our food. Rain is water that keeps the plants on Earth alive. The oceans are full of it! 
But have you ever wondered why they call it H₂O? Water is composed of two atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen. Pretty funny, right? Atoms are the tiny particles that make up everything. If you haven’t learned about them yet that’s ok. You’ll get around to it sooner or later. Scientist say when the atoms they join together they almost look like Mickey Mouse!

Hydrogen is a very flammable gas. It’s the lightest gas in the universe. It is used to launch rockets into space. It can even be used as fuel for cars! Oxygen is the stuff we breathe in that keeps us alive. Plants help make the oxygen for us. If you put hydrogen and oxygen together and light a match, you get a loud explosion. But when you combine them, in the right way, it makes the liquid we call water.  Pretty amazing, right?

In my lab I have a really cool piece of equipment called a fuel cell. It can make electricity from hydrogen and oxygen without it burning. Astronauts actually use fuel cells in space.
Here is a picture of my fuel cell. This time I’m not going to make electricity. I’m going to reverse it, and split the water molecules apart. This will make Hydrogen and oxygen. I can collect the gases in syringes so you can see how much I collect. Since there is twice (2 times) as much hydrogen as there is oxygen, the syringe with the hydrogen will be twice as full. 

Here’s a picture of Papaw and the finished experiment. Doesn’t Papaw look handsome in his safety glasses and lab coat?

If you would like to learn more about fuel cells, here’s a web site where you can start.

https://www.eia.gov/kids/energy-sources/hydrogen/#:~:text=Hydrogen%20fuel%20cells%20produce%20electricity%20by%20combining%20hydrogen%20and%20oxygen,connected%20to%20electric%20power%20lines.

Well, that’s all for this week. Be sure to drink enough water today. (And don’t leave your glasses water bottles lying around. Be Mom’s helper and keep things cleaned up!)

Love You!

Papaw.

Shrimp Doing Shrimpy Things

Red Shrimp

Well, we’re back in Papaw’s classroom for more animal fun. This week we are visiting his shrimp tanks. Now don’t get too excited. These are not the kind of shrimp you can eat. These are just fun to watch. I have 2 tanks. One is for red shrimp. The other one is for blue ones. They are usually called “Cherry Shrimp” because the first color that people started keeping was red. Normally in the wild they are a kind of light tan or brown with colored dots mixed in. The scientific name is Neocaridina davidi. They originally come from fresh water streams in eastern China and Taiwan, but now they are in aquariums all over the world. They are very easy to keep and also fun to watch. They now come in many colors, red, blue, green, yellow, orange, and sometimes even 2 colors.

Mom with eggs

They love to swim all around looking for algae, bits of leftovers and something called biofilm which covers plants, rocks and other surfaces in the tank. They are very busy and don’t stand still for very long. On of Papaw’s mommy shrimp is carrying eggs under her tail. Soon there will be lots and lots of tiny shrimp swimming around. I also have one little fish named Otto with them who helps keep the tank clean.

The shrimp in this tank are blue. They can be dark blue (almost black) light blue, or even in between. They are called “blue velvet”. I have attached 5 videos that you can watch. One video is of one of my other babies born a couple weeks ago. I hope you like them! If you would like to know more about cherry shrimp you and visit here:

 https://www.fishlore.com/aquariummagazine/sept09/red-cherry-shrimp.htm

      

    

Till next time!

Love You! Papaw