sydalicious, you really MUST turn the eggs at LEAST two times a day during the hatch. Three is best, but no less than two for sure. Otherwise you just aren't going to have a successful hatch--the turning keeps the developing chick from sticking to the inside of the shell and dying. You don't want to go to all the effort and then have nearly fully developed chicks that die in the shell just short of hatch, do you? Of course not. Just turn the eggs before and after school. It only takes a minute. :) I personally don't candle my eggs, because my hens lay eggs with darker shells that are impossible to see through--also, I am concerned about handling the eggs too much and either dropping them or letting them get too chilled. So I just wait and see what comes out on hatch day. :) I figure if I'm already doing everything I can, and correctly, me candling isn't going to do me any good since I can't see through the shells. But if you get some light-colored eggs and want to candle, by all means try it--here is a site with candling info and great pics: http://pubs.caes.uga.edu/caespubs/pubcd/b1166-w.html I use great big cardboard boxes for brooder boxes, and just throw them away when I'm done with them. I've got info and pics on my site about how I do my brooder box setups. I just use a large piece of chicken wire for a top (unless you have small children, cats or dogs that might get to the chicks, then use something sturdier) that I can lift on and off. I also like to cut a window in the side of the box and hot glue a piece of hardware cloth over it so the chicks can see out--being n a box for weeks without being able to see out is BORING! And overcrowding and boredom in chicks can lead to pecking, which is a bad thing. Basic brooder box setup: I use a couple of bricks to elevate my food and water containers, it keeps them cleaner by helping keep shavings out of them. Using either a quail waterer (see it in the pics, it has a smaller drinking ring area--or adding marbles to a chick waterer is a MUST--chicks can and do easily drown in water dishes. For heat I use a gooseneck desk lamp with a 75 watt bulb in it, and just adjust the head of the lamp up or down--if the chicks are huddled under it and peeping, they are too cold, if they are avoiding it in a big circle and gasping, they are too hot. In action! :) Here it is from the outside, Millie my Belgian d'Uccle is visiting the chicks: You can easily use wire to partition off a large box: In this case I had three 3 week old chicks and was going to add newly hatched chicks. Velvet ~:>

I would use a potted rose bush,with a rose variety with single petaled blooms. It depends on the time of year the fair will be held. What would be blooming then? The simpler the structure of the blooms,the easier it is to demonstrate pollenation. Cross pollenation would be merely taking pollen from one plant and putting it on the female flower parts of a different variety.Self pollenation is taking pollen from one flower on a plant and pollenating the same bloom or a different bloom of the same variety. The first thing he needs to do, is to learn the latin names of the male and female flower parts.There are many sources of information,with pictures,on the net. Try searching the net,using Pollenation,plant breeding,hybridization,crossing plants. Remember that google is limited and other search engines may give better results. Del

The link above for the Darwin experiences was interesting. I may consider some of those for an experiment. My flytrap is the only plant big enough at this point. I am so frustrated! This shipment of nine plants arrived and they are just barely seedlings! Two of then are actually so tiny that you can barely see them! They are just little sprouts, too little even to identify yet. I have had bad luck buying from other hobbyists. They are not showing me pictures and are not telling me how old the plants actually are. At this rate it will be a long time before I have a decent collection of plants. I am making it a point to specify OLDER, MATURE plants now when I buy. I guess I have been too trusting. Sorry, I guess I got a little off the subject there with my rantings.

I am a teacher, and we did an experiment like this last year in my 4th grade science class. It went like this: We took two common Dieffenbachia plants, both potted in ordinary (no added fertilizers) potting soil. Over a period of weeks, we added some all-purpose fertilizer to just one of the plants. Both plants were getting the same regular water and sitting in the same windowsill. The fertilized plant seemed to put on a little more growth. Nothing outstanding. Then, after 6 weeks or something like that, we stopped watering both plants, and watched to see how long it took for signs of distress to appear. The results were striking. The plant without fertilizer quickly started to droop and turn brown with no water. The fertilized plant kept its color and form many times longer, only starting to show stress about the time that the other plant looked almost completely dead. It was interesting. Hope that gives you some ideas. Heck, take the whole experiment if you want. I hope your son does well. good luck!