Cucumber Percentages

Here is an activity you can try with your plants. Just for this example, we will use a cucumber plant. The flowers plants produce will eventually become the fruit, or in this case, a cucumber. Gently and loosely place tape around the stems of flowers you find on your cucumber plant. In a few weeks, come back and look to see how many of the flowers are generating a cucumber. What percentage of the taped flowers now have fruit? For example, out of 5 flowers, now 3 have fruit growing. To find the percent, have the 3 exisiting fruit as the numerator and the 5 original flowers as the denominator. This equals 0.6, which is equal to 60% of the flowers producing fruit!

Leaf Geometry

If you take a look at the leaves of your plants, you will notice that they are symmetrical! Here are some examples of symmetrical leaves:

Pumpkin Leaf

Spinach Leaf

Sunflower Leaf

How Many Rows?

Here is a scenario about designing your garden. You start your seeds and 14 out of 20 have germinated into healthy seedlings. The seed package says that each plant should be spaced 10 inches for proper growth. The rows in your garden are 6 feet long. How many rows will you need to fit all 20 of the plants in your garden?

First, you should consider that each plant will need 10 inches between itself an other plants. It might help to draw out a diagram of the spacing to help you visualize the garden. Each row is 6 feet long, which is also 72 inches. While drawing the diagram, draw down a plant, then mark 10", mark another plant, 10" and so on, until you are at 72 inches. This will complete a row. You will find that each row will fit 7 plants. And you will need 2 rows to fit all 14 plants properly.

How Much Shade?

Some of the plants in your garden will not grow very well if they are in the full sun all day. You will need to do some research on the plants you plan to grow to see what kind of shade they will like best. What if one type of plant needs to be in part shade during the day? You should plot this area of your garden in a place which will be covered by shade, perhaps by a tree, for several hours during the day.

Here is an example of how you can determine what percent of your garden will be covered by shade:

The plants which will need shade need 50 sq. ft. of growing space in your 600 sq. ft. garden. What percent of your garden will be partly in the shade?

Divide 50 sq.ft. by 600 sq. ft. to determine the percent.
50 / 600 = 0.083333.
Move the decimal point two places to the right to convert the decimal into a percent.
You know that 8.3% of your garden will be in the shade.

Use of Honeybees in Gardens

You are probably very familiar with honeybees, how they gather nectar and produce honey. Did you know that if honeybees visit your garden, they will also help promote pollination in your plants? The flowers on your vegetable plants must be pollinated by insects such as honeybees so that the flower will eventually become a fruit. In order to make one pound of honey, honeybees must visit 2 million flowers. During one collection trip, a honeybee may visit 50 to 100 flowers. Does your garden have this many flowers in it? Can you estimate how many flowers there are in your garden?



Bees also use shapes called hexagons to store their honey in. This is a solid shape which allows for a solid hive structure.

The Golden Angle

As a growing plant rotates, it may demonstrate the Golden Angle in it's leaf or flower patterns. The Golden Ratio decimal is 0.618, which equals 222.5 degrees on a circle. The opposing angle is 137.5 degrees, which is known as the Golden Angle. This is the angle of rotation for flower petals, leaves, and other plant patterns. If a plant is demonstrating the golden angle, then there will be 137.5 degrees between each successive leaf as the plant continues to grow.

The Golden Ratio

Back to Fibonacci!

Plants turn in spirals as they grow, so that the cells are not produced in straight lines. It is better to grow in a circlular motion, because this is sturdier and more compact. The golden ratio for plant rotation is 1.61803... which is demonstrated in the leaf roations or flower patterns below:

When two successive Fibonacci numbers are divided, they equal numbers close to the golden ratio!

2 / 3= 1.5

3 / 5 = 1.666666

5/ 8 = 1.6