Form Submission: Participation Entry

I study how the animals in fields and in the ground of fields change the shifting of matter between leaves or green parts and brown parts. Animals that eat leaves make the green things have less of some types of matter. We think that the changes in leaves caused by animals also change the way animals eat the dead or brown leaves. We also think that, when dead leaves lose matter slowly because of these animals, it will change the matter in the leaves next year. I studied these two types of animals to see the shifting of matter and the number of green things in a field. I found that when animals eat green leaves they change the matter in them. The animals that eat dead leaves like the leaves with more matter, but the number of leaves that enter into the ground did not match the number of green things in the field. I built a thinking game to understand why. My game says that the reason is the matter in the ground. When matter goes from brown to green in a tight way the change of brown matches the change of green. But when the matter moves through real ground with lots of matter the changes don't match. Also my game shows that places which start with more green things or matter are different than places that start with less. Knowing about the slow shift through real ground and different starting places is important because they better our understanding of how animal change matter. My study shows that animal can change where matter is in the field, but that they might need years to also change the big parts of field matter: the green things and the ground.