Dyed Flower Experiment
Did you ever do a dyed flower experiment in elementary school? I tried to find carnations, but I didn’t have any luck at the grocery store, so we ended up with white daisies. The boys choose orange and teal food coloring and mixed a few drops with water in separate jars.
We read about how plants suck up water through thin tubes inside their stems. Plants have a system of vascular tissue in their stems which carry water and minerals up and down the stem.
Xylem and phloem surround the central core, the pith, in many plants. Food and water is stored in the pith. The xylem carries water and minerals upward from the roots, and the phloem brings food from the leaves (via photosynthesis) down to the lower parts of the plant.
To see this process in action, we placed the white daisies in the jars of colored water and waited to see what results we would get from the dyed flower experiment. After several hours, we could already see tiny lines of color in the petals, like veins.
It took a couple of days for more noticeable results. The color is very faint, but we can see a change. I remember carnations having a more dramatic result when I did this dyed flower experiment as a kid. If I can find some, we might try this again, but the boys now have a visual of what the books explain.
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