Soil Microbiology Experiment

Friday, 21 April 2017.  Professor Geof Smith from NMSU’s Biology Department took time to give our middle-schoolers experience in sampling bacteria from 6 soils.  Students Kira and Frankie took soil samples from the bare land and from the cultivated field by the school.  Dr. Smith brought two of his own samples.  After a lot of discussion about the plants supporting microbial populations, Kira, Frankie, and Xitlali extracted soil bacteria with sterile water, then plated a small sample (0.1 ml) onto agar plates.  We’ll catch the growth of the bacteria on Monday, the 24^th.