The wait is over! After about six weeks, sixth-graders excitedly dug up their 'soiled' undies! 

During the first week of school, the students buried new, 100% cotton undies in the soil in various areas of the Downtown Campus's  7 East patio beds. They patiently waited six weeks, and on October 29th, they dug them up and examined what had happened to them.

With the dig-up date so close to Halloween, it was perfect because the undies no longer resembled their former selves. Now they were thinned and stringy - almost like spiderwebs! Just the elastic waistbands remained intact. As many students had predicted, the microorganisms in the soil got to work munching on and decomposing the cotton, thus returning important nutrients to the soil. What a terrific lesson in soil biology and ecology that all organisms (large and small) are important to our planet. 

Try this at home when the weather warms again and the soil organisms are busy to determine what will happen in your garden!