Salt Is a Corrosive That Kills Grass
Abstract During the winter, you spread salt daily on your driveway to melt the snow. In the springtime, when the lawn begins to grow, you notice that there is no grass growing for about 3 inches from the driveway. Furthermore, the grass seems to be growing more slowly up to about 1 foot from the driveway. Can salt have an effect on the growth of grass after placing it in your driveway during the winter to melt the snow? I will perform three different experiments to find the conclusion to this problem. ? Salt is a Corrosive that Kills Grass
Salt absorbs the water from the grass and ends up killing the grass in the area the salt was place to melt the snow in the winter time. I will be measuring the grass growth each day, with the highest concentration of salt to see if it will harm the grass. First, thing is to get all the equipment needed to perform this experiment. I will need three round flower pots 1 inch in diameter and height. I will be using ? cup of ammonium sulphate fertilizer and ? cup of sodium chloride concentrations salt, rock salt (halite), and calcium magnesium acetate salt (Peeples, 1990).
The last and final ingredient I will need is three different types of grass sod, St. Augustine grass, Bahia grass, and Buffalo grass cut in 5 inches in a square diameter. All three flower pots will be deep freezes to duplicate the winter conditions during the experiment. The grass samples will be then placed in three separate flower pots. Figure 1-1 Prepare the soil for planting new grass: •Loosen the top soil from 2 to 3 inches. •Soil that is in clumps break. •Small clumps are acceptable don’t break up the top soil to fine. Fertilize the grass with Scott Starter Fertilizer •Remove any dead grass. Plant grass sod •Place the sod evenly by hand in the middle of the pot. Cover grass sod •Lightly dig the grass sod so no more than 1inch of soil covers the grass sod. In pot A I followed the steps for planting St. Augustine grass in figure 1-1. This pot will only be watered through the whole process no other ingredients add. After planting the St. Augustine grass in the pot I water the grass. Then set aside the watered St. Augustine grass pot. In pot B I followed the same steps in figure 1-1.
I planting the Bahia grass and fertilized the soil. This is to see what if any effect the fertilizer will have on the results of the sodium chloride concentrations salt, rock salt (halite), and calcium magnesium acetate salt. Next I sprinkled the soil with ? cup of salt and set pot B aside. In pot C I followed all steps for pot B and used the Buffalo grass and did not adding the fertilizer to the soil. I took all three pots and placed them in the deep freezer at the same time for two weeks. After the two weeks I removed the pots. Each pot was watered daily for 1 month.
The experiment was completed after 1 months and 2 weeks of total growth and the time in the deep freezer. The results in Pot (A) St. Augustine grass had grown an average of two inches. Pot (B) the Bahia grass which was fertilized grows in an average of 1 inch in length. Pot (C) this is the Buffalo grass which had the different salt had very little growth. It had no growth where the salt was spread with an average length of two or three centimeters. In conclusion of my experiment I discovered that salt does inhibit the growth of grass.
The pot that had the salt in the soil had less grass growth then the pot without. The fertilizer did help the growth of grass even with the soil being deep freeze. My recommendation is that if you are going to be using salt during the winter months fertilize your grass before winter. This would help your grass out from all the damage salt can do to our grass in the winter time. So we discovered that salt raises the solute level of the soil around the plant root, since plants roots often absorb water by raising the mineral level within the endodermis layer.
The amount of salt that you place on your grass in the winter time prevents water from osmotically entering the high solute level within the root, as well draining water out of the cortex osmotically. This is what causes your grass to die. References Peeples, B. (1990, November 9). Using salt to melt ice. Retrieved from http://www. madsci. org/posts/archives/1998-11/910675052. Ch. r. html Unknown. (2011, October). Weekend gardener monthly web magazine. Retrieved from http://www. weekendgardener. net/grass-types/main. htm
