Abstract

We wanted to do this project

because we have always wanted to
know why leaves have always lost
their color.

Materials
2 Books
Pencil
Paper
Woods
Sugar Maple leaves
Locust
 Walnut
Hickory
Northern Catalpa (Cigar Tree)
Sycamore
Brown paper bag
White paper bag
Tape

Purpose
 We wanted to do this project
because we have been curious if the
amount of light had affected the
breakdown of chlorophyll.

Conclusion
In our experiment we took six
different types of leaves, three
leaves of each kind, and put half of
them in the white bag and the other
half in the brown bag. We did this
experiment because we wanted to
know why leaves had lost their color
and turned brown. Our hypothesis
 was correct, the leaves that we had
put in the shade had lost their color
and turned brown. From this
experiment we learned that the
amount of sunlight a leaf gets,
affects the color a leaf is, and the
color leaf you see. What we would
do differently next time is, we would
start my project before September
and we would leave the leaves on a
tree limb. We could also take the
leaves and put them in water with
some in the bags and left some out.

Hypothesis
 If we put leaves in a brown bag,
then the chlorophyll will breakdown
quicker than in the white bag. The
brown bag takes the light away and
the white bag reflects light still
allowing chlorophyll to produce.

Future Directions
If we were going to do this project
again, we would find leaves that are
bright green/orange/yellow/red and
see how long it will take for the
chlorophyll to start breaking down.
We would also start my project in
late June early July. Another thing
we would do is we would collect
more leaf types.
This is a continued project; we did
this project in 2019-2020 and we are
continuing this project this year
with all the improvements.

Question
How does the amount of light effect
the breakdown of chlorophyll?
 Results
Results
The leaves that we put in the brown
bag had turned brown in a period of
ten days. The leaves that were put in
the white bag had kept their
green/orange/red color for a longer
period of time. The ones that
weren’t in a bag lasted a month
more than the others
Leaves lose their color due to loss of
light
Leaves lose color due to shortened
daylight hours
in the fall, because of changes in the
length of daylight and changes in
temperature, the leaves stop their
food-making process
Green substance in producers that
traps light energy from the sun,
which is then used to combine
carbon dioxide and water into
sugars in the process of
photosynthesis
They are produced in chloroplasts
in the photosynthetic tissues of the
leaf

Resources
https://www.friendsofthewildflowergarden.org/pages/plants/oakleafkey.html
https://garden.lovetoknow.com/wiki/Maple_Tree_Identification
https://www.esf.edu/pubprog/brochure/leaves/leaves.htm
https://www.sciencedaily.com/terms/chlorophyll.htm
https://harvardforest.fas.harvard.edu/leaves/pigment
 Procedure

We had gone into the woods and got

six types of leaves, two of each.
When we got home, we put six
leaves in the sun and the other six in
the shade. After two weeks we
picked the leaves up, recorded my
results, and put them in a book. We
put the leaves in the book to help
flatten them out and help draw the
moisture out.

Independent
Variable
The amount of light the leaves are
receiving and for how long we take
the light away.

Dependent Variable
The color that the leaves become