Mealworm Science
Animal Science- Grade:
- 5
- Teacher:
- Lindsay Wong
Mealworms are a little bug that has a 4-stage life cycle and many people use them for food for chickens, reptiles, and sometime humans! I raise chickens and think about the feed needed all the time. By testing which food mixture produces the most pupa, I can learn how to grow insects more efficiently, which may benefit the people in my community who raise animals and need feed. My experiment was to see what mealworm food makes mealworms into the most pupa. I compared wheat bran, rice cereal, and bread crumbs. My hypothesis was that a combination of wheat bran and rice cereal would make the most pupa. My experiment lasted 5-weeks. My results showed that wheat bran made the most pupa in 5 weeks (75). The combination of wheat bran and rice cereal made the third most amount of pupa (51). In the future I want to do the experiment for longer to see if the results stay the same.
This is an outstanding Grade 5 experimental project with strong controls, clear quantitative data, extended testing duration, and meaningful real-world application.
This experiment shows understanding of why mealworms are important, in animal feed and farming efficiency.
Good job!
Fantastic work disproving your own hypothesis! In science, finding out that one ingredient (wheat bran) works better than a mixture is a very useful discovery. Your research will be very helpful for anyone in your community who raises chickens and wants to grow their own healthy feed!