Cover Crop Runoff and Nitrate Data

Pair the case studies with the data sheets, then ask students to compare a problem with its fix. The groundwater and runoff sheets work well as map and graph labs.

Graph winter storm runoff from bare fields and cereal rye cover crops and find the percent reduction. The directions on the page read: Read the text. Fill in each Total, then draw a pair of runoff bars for each storm. An answer key is included.

Yes, both. We made it for 8th grade Earth systems, and it works the same at home or at school. At home, a student can work through it alone and then go over it with you, which shows quickly what is solid and what needs another look. In class it works as independent practice, homework or a warm-up, and you can print one copy or a full set.

Factory trawlers caught huge amounts of cod after the 1950s, and later quotas rested on stock estimates that were far too high. By the early 1990s few adult cod were left, and Canada closed the fishery in 1992. Atlantic Cod Collapse and Fishing Limits graphs the catch.

In the 1960s the Soviet Union dug canals to carry river water to new cotton fields, so less water reached the lake while evaporation went on. The lake shrank and grew saltier, and commercial fishing ended. Aral Sea Shrinking Case Study graphs its area over time.

A cover crop such as cereal rye holds soil in place, slows water so more soaks in and takes up leftover nitrogen. That cuts runoff and the nitrate it carries to streams. The cover crop sheet has students find the percent reduction from sample data.