Eutrophication

Eutrophication

Introduction

Europhication (the over enrichment of aquatic ecosystems with nutrients leading to algal blooms and anoxic events) is a persistent condition of surface waters and a widespread environmental problem (Carpenter, 2005). The main cause is excessive loading into the system of phosphorus and nitrogen, resulting in high algal biomass, dominance by cyanobacteria, and loss of macrophytes (Dixit, 2005). When the nutrient concentrations rise to extremely high levels, eutrophication occurs. There are two stages, which begin with the algal bloom. Algal bloom creates a barrier at the surface of the water, which prevents sunlight from coming through, which eventually kills the algae and other plants. This brings us to the ends in which there are a high amount of dead organisms and can even cause what is know as fish kill.

After setting up the three experiments called control, moderate, and high, I believe that in the Raphanus sativus plant, the nutrient loading and productivity will rise and the diversity will fall. All three of the plants will grow but the height will differ between the control, moderate and high plants. The control will have a lower height, the moderate will be higher and the high will have the highest height. With the Elodea densa, Eutrophication will occur in all three aquariums. All three will be different because of the different types of fertilizer. Control will have no pollution, the moderate tank will have some, and the high tank will have a lot because of the excessive agricultural runoff. By doing this project I hope to gain a more understanding of pollution and how it affects our aquatic and terrestrial environments. I believe now that Eutrophication is a growing problem and after the project I hope to gain a better understanding of how to prevent it.

Methods

When we started the Terrestrial Environment of the Eutrophication procedure we got three pots from the teacher, filled them with soil, planted two seeds in holes about 1-2 cm deep, covered them, watered them, and then placed them in the tray on the plant rack. We later took out one of the two plants because anymore will kill the plants entirely. Remember to not add any fertilizer the first week but every week after you should water the plants with your assigned treatment.

After the terrestrial environment was set up we started the Aquatic Environment. Here we obtained the Elodea Densa (aquatic plant). We then absorbed the water and divided it into three even amounts and determined the mass for all three plants. We named and recorded them in "Control", "Moderate" and "High". Next we measured the nitrate, nitrite, and phosphorous with the test kits and tested the water from the "Control" tank and recorded it.

Every week we measured the water quality assigned to our bench for all three treatments. Each bench had different tasks such as; bench 1 tested for dissolved oxygen, bench 2 tested for conductivity, bench 3 tested for pH, bench 4 tested for optical density, and bench 5 recorded the temperature for each tank and then watered the tanks with the solution. In this experiment we used a pH meter, a conductivity meter, a thermometer, a spectrophotometer, and a ruler. We then checked for the levels of nutrients for the moderate and high tanks. Finally we weighed and recorded the results for each of the plants.

Results

Figure 1. The amount of dissolved oxygen over a five-week period.

Figure 2. The Conductivity of the plants in a five-week period.

Figure 3. The pH level over a five-week period.

Figure 4. The optical density over a five-week period.

Figure 5. The temperature over a five-week period.

Figure 6. The change in nutrients between phosphate, nitrate, and nitrite.

Figure 7. The change