. Whizz Pop Bang Science Magazine for Kids! Issue 116: Signs of Spring

Fun with springs!

spring of

ISSN 2399 -2840

signs

THE AWESOME SCIENCE MAGAZINE FOR KIDS!

Make a bird feeder

The secret science of seeds

t Cut ou hat st f l owe r m i n bloo r wa t e WHIZZPOPBANG.COM ISSUE 116

EXPERIMENTS PUZZLES AMAZING FACTS SCIENCE NEWS

WELCOME!

Let’s spring into action!

Riley

Spring is in the air, and this edition of Whizz Pop Bang is bursting with exciting expe rim ents, activities and fun fact s about the science of springt ime! Plant up some stop-mot ion be an pots to se e all the stages of a se ed growing into a plant, then whip up some energy-filled se ed balls to snack on. Disc ov er the science of springs and make your own bouncing Y toy!

We’ll also be travelling back in time to me et botanist Agnes Arber and learning all about spring lambs!

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I’m off to watch my paper flowers bloom in water!

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WHIZZ POP BANG is only available by subscription. If you haven’t subscribed yet, simply go to whizzpopbang.com and sign up for as little as £4.59 per magazine, including UK delivery.

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Welcome to WHIZZ POP BANG – the magazine bursting with enticing articles, mind-boggling facts and hands-on experiments to get your child hooked on science! Whizz Pop Bang is a gender-neutral magazine with plenty of inspirational male and female scientists and content that appeals to all children.

The magazine is ideal for home educators and it’s linked to the National Curriculum too, for use in schools. Whizz Pop Bang will help with literacy development as well. Transform science teaching in your school with our hands-on science and reading resources. Our downloadable lesson packs link fun science experiments and reading with key curriculum topics for years 2-6. Subscribe at whizzpopbang.com/schools

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All experiments have been tried and tested by our team.

The activities should be done under close adult supervision and are done at your own risk. Launchpad Publishing Ltd cannot accept liability for damage done.

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As well as our writers, we also have a team of science advisers who help to ensure that our content is accurate, up-to-date and relevant. Our advisers include: palaeontologist Steve Brusatte; molecular microbiologist Matt Hutchings; robotics engineer Abbie Hutty; mechanical engineer Aimee Morgans; GP Dr Cathy Scott; astronomer Mark Thompson; physicist Dr Jess Wade; child psychologist Dr Naira Wilson.

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Editor-in-Chief: Jenny Inglis Editor: Tammy Osborne Designer: Rachael Fisher Illustrator: Clive Goodyer Contributors: Joe Inglis, Tara Pardo, Isabel Thomas and Joanna Tubbs

Emmi

Where you see this symbol, use a QR code reader on a phone or tablet to visit a relevant web page.

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CONTENTS

Meet nature’s supermums, check out some futuristic gadgets and read some British Science Week news!

SEED SECRETS

10

12

SPRING INTO ACTION

14

Explore the science of springs and make a bouncing Y toy.

EMMI’S ECO CLUB

16 erstock.com

22 Atom

to

Pollen plagues people who suffer from hay fever.

But can science ride to the rescue?

Vet Joe Inglis takes a gambol with the spring lambs.

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SPOTLIGHT

ANIMAL ANTICS

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Discover the secret science of seeds, plant stop-motion bean pots and make super seed energy balls!

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©S hu tte rs

6

AWESOME NEWS AND AMAZING FACTS

4

17

Make a recycled bird feeder to help our garden friends to raise their chicks.

PULLOUT

Wow your friends with paper flowers that open before your very eyes.

INTERVIEW WITH A SCIENCE HERO

Meet vet Josie Campbell and find out what it’s like to spend your days helping animals.

24

HOW STUFF WORKS

Clickety-click! What goes on inside a retractable pen?

TEN AWESOMELY AMAZING…

things made from plants, from bike tyres to Whizz Pop Bang magazine!

26

INCREDIBLE INVENTIONS ©

As a child, Agnes Arber was potty about plants.

She grew up to be a world-famous botanist.

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30

I’d love to see pictures of your experiments! Send them to Y@whizzpopbang.com and ask an adult to tag us on social media @whizzpopbangmag

35

SPECTACULAR SCIENCE

Take a closer look at one of the first signs of spring – frogspawn!

32 34

28

Y’S WONDER CLUB

Ask our robot, Y, your burning science questions and share all of your adventures in science with the club.

QUIZ POP BANG AND COMPETITION

Test your knowledge with our super-duper science quiz and win an Explosive Science kit!

JOKES AND ANSWERS

Laugh out loud at some awesome jokes and find the answers to all of our quizzes, puzzles and riddles.

FIND THE SCIENCE EQUIPMENT Hidden on each double page is a piece of science equipment. Tick each one to find the complete kit!

s Awesome New cts and Amazing Fa

S M U M R E P U S NATURE’S

Unlike many reptiles, crocodile mums fiercely protect their eggs and carry their hatchlings in their mouths to keep them safe.

It’s Mother’s Day on March 30th, when we celebrate our mums and others who help to take care of us. So, let’s take a look at some of nature’s best mums!

Orangutan mums stay with their young for six or seven years, teaching them vital survival skills.

Female fen raft spiders spin a silk egg sac to carry their babies around in, which they frequently dip into water to prevent it from drying out.

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ck.com

Emperor penguin mums leave their eggs in dad’s care and head out to sea to hunt for fish. When they return, two months later, they regurgitate (vomit up) the food into the mouths of the newly hatched chicks.

PREHISTORIC PUKE A fossil hunter in Denmark has discovered some Cretaceous vomit! The fossilised vomit is thought to be 66 million years old and is likely to have been thrown up by a fish.

© Consumer Technology Association (CTA)®

All photographs © Shuttersto

To keep their eggs safe, hoopoe birds cover them in a smelly antimicrobial secretion which protects them from bacteria and also wards off any potential predators!

A SNEAK PEAK AT THE FUTURE

If you think it’s been windy on Earth recently, imagine what it would be like to live on WASP-127 b. This giant exoplanet has winds over 20,000 miles per hour – more than 80 times faster than the highest wind speeds ever recorded on our planet!

WASP-127 b, which is located about 520 light years from Earth, is a gas giant that’s even bigger than Jupiter, the biggest gas giant in our own solar system. Scientists used a large telescope on Earth to track the speed of molecules in the planet’s atmosphere and used this data to calculate the wind speed.

From the 7th-16th of March,

British Science Week

will be celebrating all things science, with loads of events running throughout the UK. Your school can get involved too, so show this to your teacher! You can find out if there are any events near you here:

bit.ly/3EhI8xz

There are also free activity packs full of fun things to do at home and at school, from building an axolotl pond in Minecraft to building a wormery and learning some deep sea yoga! Download your activity pack here: bit.ly/3Ekd4NK

© Consumer Technology Association (CTA)®

And why not enter the poster competition. This year’s theme is ‘Change and adapt,’ so your poster could be about animals adapting to changing surroundings, how humans are having to adapt our behaviour to protect the environment or your own interpretation of the theme.

Enter before the 3rd of April here: bit.ly/3Ctolup

© British Science Association

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© ESO/L Calçada

In January, the world’s biggest technology show, CES, hit Las Vegas, USA, wowing us with the latest gadgets from around the globe. This year’s inventions included sunglasses that can translate foreign languages for you, a car with a human-carrying drone folded into the boot, so you can jump out of the car and into your flying machine, and a machine that can turn milk into 17 different kinds of cheese, producing a ball of mozzarella in just two hours. There was a whole army of robot pets, including Jennie, a lifelike robot Labrador puppy, and Mirumi, a cute fluffball that clings to your bag like a baby koala and turns its head towards anyone nearby. There was even an automatic vacuum cleaner with a robotic arm to pick your dirty socks up off the floor – now that’s progress!

WINDY WORLD

Seed secrets

Have you ever wondered how whole plants come out of tiny seeds?

There’s a lot more to seeds than you might think!

SEED SCAVENGER HUNT

Flowering plants start off as seeds. There are loads of different kinds of seed, from a tiny poppy seed to an enormous coconut! See how many different seeds you can find around your kitchen. You might find them in the fruit bowl, the fridge, the spice rack, the cupboards or even the freezer – beans, peas, tomatoes, rice, sweetcorn, avocado stones and peanuts are all seeds, and so are lots of spices, like cumin and coriander.

You could ask a

grown-up to help you cut some of them in half to see what’s inside.

WHAT’S IN A SEED?

A seed is a protection pod for the baby seedling inside (called the embryo, just like a developing human baby). Inside a seed there is also food to help the seedling grow (called the endosperm). The tough outer layer is called the seed coat. This stops the embryo from drying out and also protects it from being digested if an animal eats the seed!

m The endosper n ca s from seed to also help you that ur grow! The flo from bread is made p is the ground-u a endosperm of wheat seed.

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WAKE UP AND GROW! Seeds remain in a sleeping state (they are dormant) until they have all the things they need to start growing: water, oxygen and warmth. Water and oxygen get into the seed through tiny holes called pores in the seed coat. The seed swells up until the coat splits open. The embryo starts to grow: the root grows downwards in search of nutrients from the soil and the shoot grows upwards in search of light. This process is called germination.

STOP-MOTION BEAN POTS See all the different stages of germination at the same time with this awesome experiment!

Yo u will need

ean seeds (any kind – you B can buy these at a garden centre) Compost A large see-through cup (or you could cut the bottom half off a large plastic bottle) Paper napkins Newspaper A cardboard toilet roll tube Masking tape or a rubber band

W h a t y o u do 1. Fold a piece of newspaper in half. Cut out a rough circle, about 10-12 cm in diameter, and use this to seal the end of the cardboard tube by gathering the newspaper around the end of the tube and securing it with masking tape or a rubber band.

2. Fill the tube with compost, gently pushing it down as you go. Be careful not to break through the newspaper!

3. Stand the tube in the see-through cup and stuff the gap between the tube and the sides of the cup with paper napkins.

4. Push your finger about 4 cm into the compost and plant a seed in the hole you have made, covering it with more compost and gently patting it down.

5. Push another seed 4 cm down between the side of the cup and the napkin so that you can see it from the outside. Gently pour some water into the tube and over the napkin so that both the compost and the napkin are damp, but not too wet.

I used to hate eating seeds.

But recently, they've been growing on me!

Yo u should find

Your beans should start to sprout within 3-5 days. After a week or two you should be able to see all the different stages of the germination process as you turn your cup around. Look out for the green shoot growing upwards and the white root growing downwards. When the bean plant in the cardboard tube has grown two large leaves you can plant it outside or transfer it to a plant pot filled with compost (the cardboard tube will just dissolve into the soil). Keep your bean plant well watered and support it with a bamboo cane as it grows taller.

You might even see some beans growing after a few months!

Next, why not try setting up another experiment to investigate how temperature affects the speed of germination, placing one cup in an airing cupboard or near a radiator and another in a cooler place.

6. Every two days, push another seed between the napkin and the cup, working your way around the cup until you have planted around 6-8 seeds. Make sure you keep the compost and napkins damp.

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THE CIRCLE OF LIFE Once the plant has grown out of the ground, its leaves can use energy from the Sun to make food for the plant, helping it to grow bigger.

This is called photosynthesis.

The plant produces flowers and eventually a new batch of seeds.

How do brand-new spring flowers greet each other?

“Hey, bud!”

TOPSY-TURVY GROWTH

You can see this in action if you fill a see-through cup with paper napkins and push several bean seeds between the tissue and the cup so that you can see them. Sprinkle some water into the cup to moisten the tissue and add a little more water each day to keep it damp. Wait until the shoot and root have grown about a cm long then turn the cup upside-down for a few days and watch them change direction as they sense that they are going the wrong way!

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WHICH WAY IS UP?

You might have noticed houseplants facing or even growing towards the window. They do this because plants are able to sense light and grow towards it.

But how do the roots and shoots coming out of a seed germinating underground know which direction to grow in? Plants can also sense gravity, so they know whether to grow up or down!

Follow the roots to find out which plant came from which seed. Check your answer on page 34.

SUPER SEED ENERGY BALLS

These n snacks contai me nuts, which so rgic to. people are alle u check Make sure yo re sharing allergies befo nds! them with frie

Seeds are packed full of nutrients and energy to help them germinate underground, so they’re really good for you! Try making these delicious energy balls for when you need an energy boost!

Yo u will need

How many seeds did you spot in this recipe?

Pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds are obvious, but did you know that rolled oats are made from oat seeds? And nuts, such as almonds, are also seeds.

50 g rolled oats 75 g raw pumpkin seeds 100 g raisins 1 tsp ground cinnamon 2 tbsp sunflower seeds 120 g unsalted almond or peanut butter 120 g honey 2 tbsp maple syrup

1 tsp vanilla extract Food processor Weighing scales Teaspoon Tablespoon Large mixing bowl Mixing spoon Greaseproof paper Plastic container

W hat yo u do

1. Wash your hands thoroughly before starting.

2. Add 40 g of oats and about half of the pumpkin seeds to the food processor. Ask an adult to help you whizz them around until finely ground.

3. Transfer to the mixing bowl and add the remaining oats and pumpkin seeds along with the raisins, cinnamon, sunflower seeds, peanut or almond butter, honey, maple syrup and vanilla extract. Stir until you’ve made a dough-like mixture.

4. Using your hands, roll the mixture into balls about 2 cm across and place them on greaseproof paper in a plastic container.

5. Place the container in the freezer for 20 minutes. You can then store your energy balls in the fridge and eat them when you need energy!

One cashew nut contains three times as much energy than an AA battery!

I’d love to see your seed energy balls! Take a photo and ask an adult to tag us on social media @whizzpopbangmag and email it to Y@whizzpopbang.com

SPOTLIGHT

r e v e F y Ha A-a-a-choooo! Pollen may be vital for the planet, but it’s a big problem for hay fever sufferers. Could science solve the problem?

What is hay fever?

A tingling nose, a snot tsunami, unstoppable sneezing and itchy, watering eyes… the symptoms of hay fever are hard to ignore.

It’s an allergic reaction to tiny allergens in the air. For some sufferers, it’s like having a really bad cold for months at a time. It can stop you from sleeping and concentrating at school. Hay fever can be especially tough for people who already have asthma or eczema.

Hay fever affects up to

What causes hay fever?

Hay fever is a type of

allergic rhinitis (an

inflammation inside the nose) caused by pollen. In spring and summer, the air is full of microscopic tree and grass pollen.

For most people it’s not a problem. But when a hay fever sufferer breathes in pollen, their immune system goes on red alert! Antibodies in your blood attach to the pollen and flag it up. In response, your cells release chemicals, such as histamine, to fight the ‘invader’.

These chemicals make the lining of your nose and throat produce extra mucus.

one in four people in the UK

Pollen count How many pollen grains can you count?

Check your answer on page 34.

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Pollen-avoiding tips for hay fever sufferers:

what about

treatments?

Doctors can prescribe medicines, such as antihistamines and decongestants, but they don’t work for everyone.

Scientists think that pollen tablets might be more promising.

Eating honey produced by local bees has the same effect as taking pollen tablets Answer on page 34

Pollen tablets?

But pollen causes hay fever!

The idea is that patients are given small amounts of pollen over a long stretch of time. This makes their immune system less sensitive, and more likely to ignore pollen in future. It’s a type of immunotherapy that aims to change the body’s immune system, rather than fighting it.

Scientists in Japan are investigating whether rice could be genetically modified to contain tiny amounts of pollen allergens. Just like pollen tablets, this could train the immune system to stop overreacting to pollen and help people with hay fever feel better.

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AL ANIM S TIC

AN

LAmbs

Newborn lambs are as much a part of spring as daffodils and April showers. But why are our fields so filled with the bleating of baby sheep at this time of year? TV vet Joe Inglis takes a gambol with the lambs…

People have kept sheep for thousands of years, across nearly all of the inhabited areas of the world, for their wool, their milk and their meat. It’s thought that there are around 1 billion domestic sheep alive today – around 1 for every 6 people in the world. In some countries, sheep actually outnumber people; in New Zealand there are over 25 million sheep but only 5 million people!

Spring into life Lambs (sheep that are less than one year old) are mainly reared for meat. The reason why the fields are so full of lambs in the spring is that sheep are seasonal breeders, which means they only have babies at certain times of the year. Female sheep, called ewes, breed with the male rams in the late summer and autumn. They are pregnant for 5 months so most lambs are born in the spring months.

Counting sheep Counting sheep or lambs jumping over a fence is a well-known technique for trying to get to sleep. However, according to research from Oxford University, we’d be better off imagining a calm scene, such as a waterfall.

Ewes are dedicated mothers who form very strong bonds with their lambs and can recognise them just from the sound of their bleating.

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What do you call it when a sheep jumps out at you?

A lambush!

It's no accident that lambs are born in the spring. Sheep have evolved this reproductive strategy because it gives the lambs as long as possible to grow big and strong before the winter.

Ewe-sful facts Sheep are thought to have very good memories and can remember at least 50 individual sheep and humans for many years.

Sheep are intelligent animals capable of problem solving and are considered to have a similar level of intelligence to cows.

Lambs are relatively independent at birth; they can stand on their feet soon after being born.

Woolly wonders Most sheep are sheared every year and their wool has some awesome properties. Even astronauts on the International Space Station wear t-shirts containing wool!

Wool is... anti-microbial – which means that bacteria don’t like to live on it

fire resistant – clothes made from wool just tend to smoulder

water-repellent – the waxy coating means that

liquids just run off the surface

long-lasting – woollen fibres can be bent

20,000 times without breaking

insulating – wool is wonderful at keeping us warm

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G R P N I S ! n o i o t t a c n i

ir, so a e h is in t look at g n i r a Sp king f spring a t e we’r er kind o pe! ty th the o e bouncy – th

SQUASHY SPRINGS

Y is bouncing on a compression spring. This sort of spring has gaps between its coils. When the spring is compressed, the coils are pushed more tightly together.

As soon as the spring is released, it bounces back to its original shape, making Y bounce in the air!

SUPER-STRETCHY A slinky toy is an example of an extension spring.

It has coils that touch each other. When you pull this type of spring, the coils become further apart, before bouncing back together as soon as you let go. Trampolines often have extension springs around their edges.

© Shutterstock.com

We’ve found an extension spring and streeeeetched it!

What’s going to happen next?!

Oh dear!

I let go of the spring and it has bounced back onto poor Riley!

If Emmi had stretched the spring much further it would have been ruined. When springs are stretched too far, they become deformed and they don’t return to their original shape.

14 whizzpopbang.com

Yo u will need

If you have a clothes peg, a clipboard or a butterfly hairgrip then you have a torsion spring. These springs are designed so the coils twist into a tighter spiral when they are compressed.

A bamboo skewer Two wooden beads (one must have a hole big enough to slide freely along the skewer) An apple The spring from the inside of a retractable biro

Some springs don’t have coils at all.

Sticky tape Glue The Y template, cut out from the pullout section (pages 19 and 20)

W hat yo u do

Leaf springs are shaped like arches;

they are often used in the suspension systems of cars and trains.

1. Stab the skewer into the apple so that it stands up vertically.

2. Carefully pull on the very end of the wire at one end of the spring so that it uncoils slightly.

3. Use this sticking-out bit of wire to make a tiny puncture hole in a narrow strip of sticky tape. Push the wire through the tape from the non-sticky side and twist the spring a couple of turns so that a small section of spring is forced through the tape.

4. Stick the tape with the spring sticking out of it onto the side of a bead that fits onto the skewer.

A leaf spring on a train

© NordhornerII

5. Push the other end of the spring into the hole in the middle of a second bead (or attach it with sticky tape as before).

A spring changes its shape when a force is applied, then returns to its original shape when the force is removed.

6. Glue the backs of the Y templates and stick them together around the second bead.

LIFE-SAVING SPRINGS Springs are used for all sorts of things – even for saving lives. A stent is a tiny, springy tube that surgeons can implant inside the arteries (big blood vessels) of patients with heart disease. This life-saving device pushes outwards on the walls of the patient’s artery, opening it out and helping their blood to flow freely again. © Frank C Müller

g

MAKE A BOUNCING Y TOY!

OTHER TYPES OF SPRING

7. Thread the first bead onto the skewer and give Y a gentle tap to start bouncing down the pole!

You might need to adjust Y’s position to make it work.

Yo u should find

With each bounce, there is a brief moment when the hole in the middle of the bead is lined up exactly with the vertical skewer, allowing the bead to slip downwards. As the spring starts to pull or push the bead again, the angle of the bead changes so that it catches against the skewer. This results in friction, which prevents Y from sliding until the spring bounces back and the bead is briefly aligned again.

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b... clu O C E

Emmi’s

BIRD FEEDER The birds in your neighbourhood will be starting to raise chicks in spring.

Help them out by leaving them some tasty treats!

1

Yo u will need

An empty, clean and dry plastic bottle with all labels removed (the measu rements below are based on a two -pin t milk bottle) A permanent marker pen A ruler A sharp knife (and an adult to use it!)

A few fairly straight sticks Strong glue or a glue gun A piece of twine about 30 cm long Optional: stickers or acr ylic pai nts Seeds (see box below)

2

Draw a dot in the middle of one side of the bottle, 2 cm from the bottom, then repeat on the opposite side. Now draw doors measuring about 6 cm by 4 cm, 2 cm above each dot.

3

Ask an adult to cut holes with the knife, roughly the width of one Be of your sticks, where you drew fu care l with your dots. Now ask them to cut the sharp of s side e thre om bott the around edges! up. rs doo the Fold each door.

4

3

Wiggle the stick into one hole, through the bottle, and out through the hole on the other side.

16 whizzpopbang.com

Tie one end of the twine tightly around the bottle neck, below the threads that the lid screws onto. Now tie the other end of the twine into a loop over the top of the bird feeder. Screw the lid back on.

Continued on page 21 ➜

I’d love to see your bird feeder! Take a photo and ask an adult to tag us on social media @whizzpopbangmag and email it to Y@whizzpopbang.com

5

Cut your sticks into pieces about 8 cm long (ask an adult to help if they are too tough), then ask an adult to help you glue them onto the bottle. You could use permanent markers, stickers or acrylic paints to decorate your bird feeder and experiment with other materials for the roof, like lolly sticks or plastic packaging.

6

Use a spoon to fill the bottom of the bird feeder with seeds, then hang it outside and watch the birds feast!

More

ECO

ideas...

put Wondering what to in your feeder?

popular with unflower seeds are S s. ches, sparrows and tit greenfinches, chaffin s, tract tits, greenfinche Nyjer seeds could at d atches, great spotte house sparrows, nuth kins. woodpeckers and sis ent lly have lots of differ Garden centres usua se between! seed mixtures to choo

Continued from page 16

We can all help to save the planet. Lots of small actions can make a BIG difference!

Birds can share our leftovers, too! e, Cooked unsalted ric e porridge oats, appl cores and bananas are popular with our feathered friends.

whizzpopbang.com 21

➜

We’d love to see a photo of your blooming flowers!

Send it to Y@whizzpopbang.com and ask an adult to tag us on social media @whizzpopbangmag

Yo u should find

The petals should open, revealing your flowers in full bloom! This is an example of capillary action. Water travels up narrow gaps and tubes by itself. The narrower the gap or tube, the further the water climbs. Plants use capillary action to help draw water up from the soil through their stems to their leaves and flowers.

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Paper is full of gaps between its tiny fibres.

Capillary action causes the water to move through these gaps, making the paper swell.

When the swelling reaches the creases, they expand and the petals open back out. You can see capillary action at work every time you use a paper towel to mop up a water spillage.

PULL OUT pages 17-20 and get making!

BLOOMING FLOWERS Watch paper flowers bloom before your very eyes!

Yo u will need

Scissors A large dish filled with water

What yo u do

Find a printable version of the pullout here: bit.ly/42nHb0n

1. Cut out the flowers below.

2. Gently fold the petals into the centre of the flower without flattening the creases too much.

3. Carefully place the flowers, petal side up, in a large dish of water.

Colour your own blooming flowers! whizzpopbang.com 17

Petal p uz z ler

Can you draw six flowers in six of these nine boxes without placing three in a row?

Check your answer on page 34.

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Riddles

Check your answers on page 34.

d I’m first 1) I wear a trumpet an ld of the to sing; a yellow hera I? coming spring. What am 2) What falls but neve

r gets hurt?

3) How does spring end?

Y templates

for the activity on page 15.

whizzpopbang.com 19

Interview with a SCIENCE HERO

In my job I get to...

Help animals Josie Campbell works as a vet in Somerset.

If you have any questions of your own for Josie, you can contact her on josie@naturalbalancevetnutrition.com

“

Vets look after all kinds of animals…

Josie Campbell

”

…house pets, horses, farm animals and animals that would normally be found in the wild or in a zoo. One day when I was working at a wildlife centre, a hedgehog came in that had been hit by a car. We managed to fix his bro ken leg, and he made a full recovery and was released back into the wild. But he was a bit tricky to handle with all the spikes!

Vet

© yul38885 / Shu tterstock.com

Some animals are more cuddly than others!

“

I was a teenager the first time I saw a lamb being born.

”

It was a magical moment I’ll nev er forget!

Seeing a brand new life enter the world brought a tear to my eye. I’ve delivered lots of lambs since then – it’s usu ally pretty messy, often very late at night and it can be tiring. But it always feels like a privilege to be able to help at such a special tim e. © Kirti Bhole / Shuttersrock.com

Sheep often have twins or triplet and sometimes even more s – .

In 2015, one ewe gave birth to a recordbreaking seven healthy lambs! That’s septuplets!

Interview with a SCIENCE HERO

“

Being a vet is a great job for animal lovers!

”

I always loved animals when I was little and it’s a dream come true to have made it as a vet, but it takes a lot of hard work.

Having a strong interest in science is essential, and it’s very important to work hard at school, as vet schools require you to have good exam grades. Animals can’t tell you what’s wrong themselves, so being good at talking to the owners of the animals is also really important.

Josie loves working with animals

“

But it can be hard work.

”

t or Sometimes you have to work at nigh lly if ecia esp h, weekends which can be toug ’re you an emergency call comes in right as it about to tuck into Christmas lunch! And , I was can sometimes be a bit gross. One day er fing my n whe examining a dog’s bottom k -gun poo slipped and I ended up with stinky er lot bett squirting right at me! The dog felt a e too com to ted wan after that, but nobody ! day the of close to me for the rest

Bandaging a sore paw ck.com

Curing sick animals is a great feeling!

”

It feels wonderful to be part of a team of people who all have the same desire to help animals to lead healthy and happy lives. On top of this, there’s so much variety in my days – they are always unpredictable and exciting, and you never know what to expect. I find that really fun – it’s impossible to get bored!

© Happy monkey / Shutterstock.com

“

© H_Ko / Shuttersto

Being a vet is never boring whizzpopbang.com 23

HOW STUFF

WORKS 1

Ballpoint pens You probably use ballpoint pens all the time, but how do they work, why is the ink so sticky, and where does that clicking sound come from?

Grab a clicky pen and let’s see how they work…

If you look at the tip of a ballpoint pen, you’ll see a tiny ball inside it. The ball is normally made of a hard metal, like steel, and it sits in a socket (the cone-shaped metal end). Inside the pen, an ink-filled tube leads down to the ballpoint. When you put the pen to paper and start to write, the ball begins to roll over the paper, bringing the ink along with it. The ink sticks first to the ball and then to the paper. Because there is only a tiny gap between the ball and the socket, only a thin, even layer of ink can come out at a time. When you stop writing, the ball works like a lid, keeping the sticky ink inside the pen so it doesn’t dry out.

Like many inventions, biros are named after one of their inventors. László Bíró was a Hungarian journalist in the 1930s who was fed up with his fountain pen leaking ink, so he came up with the idea of using sticky ink, which doesn’t drip out of the pen.

24 whizzpopbang.com

3

Ball

Socket

Although the push mechanisms are different, almost all retractable pens have one thing in common: at the bottom of the pen, there is a spring inside which is pushing upwards. When you push the button slowly, you can feel the resistance of that spring.

Which doodle line leads to the ballpoint pen? Check your answer on page 34.

a b c d e

2

4

Pushing the button on a retractable pen (which can pull the ballpoint inside the pen when you’re not using it) triggers a hidden mechanism. As you push, you’ll hear a click – that is the sound of the mechanism inside unlocking. There are lots of different types of pens with different mechanisms for retracting the ballpoints. Some of them are very complicated; others are simple.

5 Most retractable pens use a cam mechanism. A cam is a sort of plastic wheel that rotates when you push the button. It has four ‘teeth’, two long and two short.

When the pen is retracted, a loaded spring keeps the upper cam and lower cam pressed together. When you press the button, the upper cam pushes the lower cam past the guide pin and the force of the compressed spring makes the lower cam rotate, pushing the pen out so that it is ready to use. When you press the button a second time, the spring is once more compressed past the change point, making the lower cam rotate and guiding the upper cam back into the retracted position.

whizzpopbang.com 25

.

g.. in z a m A ly e m o s e w A 0 1

P M O R F E D T H I NG S M A you’re ur bike to the paper From the tyres of yo any rised to learn how m rp su be ll u’ yo g, in read plants! e ac tually made from ever yday objects ar

1

Rubber bike tyres are made from the milky sap that oozes out of the bark of a Brazilian tree.

2 3

4

The black pepper you grind onto your food is made from the dried and ground-up berries of a flowering vine.

26 whizzpopbang.com

Some soaps are made from the oil of palm trees grown in Asia.

Wine bottle corks are made from the bark of cork oak trees.

5

Your denim jeans are made from the soft fibres surrounding the seeds of cotton plants.

S T N A L P M

6

If you play the violin or cello you will rub your bow with rosin, which is resin from a pine tree.

7

is made from the seeds of the cacao tree.

© USAID Biodiversity &

9 10

8

Chocolate

Forestry / Wikimedia Com

mons

Cane furniture

is made from rattans – climbing plants from the rainforests of Asia.

Doormats

are often made from the fibres from coconut husks.

The paper you’re holding right now is made from tree trunks!

The wood is chopped up and boiled to a pulp, then flattened out and dried.

All other photographs

© Shutterstock.com

I ncredible I nventions

Agnes Arber

Agnes’s career as a plant scientist began when she was just thirteen!

Her dedication helped the world to recognise the amazing talent of women in science.

Agnes was born into a family of explorers, scientists, academics and artists. Her mother encouraged her to find out about plants, and her father began giving her drawing lessons when she was three years old.

It’s my first scientific paper!

Now I’m a real scientist!

e. zin

ivy -l

e

At thirteen, Agnes saw a picture of a Agnes was born plant cell in a book. It in 1879 in was the first time she London, England had heard about the tiny building blocks that all living things are made of. and decided to le d e t cina r study of a g arn a fas lants. He ard s m s a p l i b s h u e p d t s w a in th en pl uch s bou –w es an x e a dfla n ch t as g d o a l ol – t sh A u o t m he co ed ag v a ea

One day, a botanist (plant scientist) called Ethel Sargant gave a talk to the science club at Agnes’s school. She saw how much Agnes loved botany and invited her to work in her lab in the holidays.

After university, Agnes began working as Ethel’s research assistant, comparing different seedlings. She became an expert in seedlings that have just one leaf – known as monocotyledons (say mon-oh-cot-il-ee-dons).

There are two types of flowering plants.

Monocotyledons have seedlings with one leaf.

Dicotyledons (say DY-COT-IL-EE-DONS) have seedlings with two leaves.

28 whizzpopbang.com

Conifers

Water plants

Grasses

Fossilised plants

Agnes spent more than 50 years studying plants. She looked closely at the different parts and recorded them with amazing illustrations. She also studied the parts you can only see under a microscope.

Agnes was brilliant at describing her science in a way that other people could understand. She published eight books and 93 scientific papers!

In 1946, Agnes was the first woman botanist and the third woman ever to become a fellow of the Royal Society, one of the most famous groups of scientists in the world.

and Agnes hed s i l b d e u v o p also l ms! e o p g 3 1 writin poetry When the lab that Agnes worked at was closed, she was determined to keep studying plants.

She took the equipment home and set up her own lab in a bedroom. It was cramped and there was no electricity, but she kept on making new observations and discoveries!

In later life, Agnes wrote about how scientists work.

She helped to define what it means to be a scientist.

The whole wide field of research lies waiting to be explored, and no other ‘open sesame’ is needed but the singleminded desire to discover truth for its own sake.

Email me at Y@whizzpopbang.com

der Club!

Welcome to Y’s Won to share your This page is for you with our robot, adventures in science p Bang readers!

Y, and other Whizz Po ce question Everyone whose scien is page gets answered on th ng wins a Whizz Pop Ba Science Joke Book, ome available in our awes at online science shop

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F oR

Hello Y, My question is why don’t things filled up with air sink in the water?

CURIoUS K I DS

Thanks, Aidan, aged 7

We loved seeing all the brilliant solar system models you made (from the Cosmic Explorers edition, Issue 112).

ed 8 Matthew, ag

My favourite fact from this activity was ‘a year on Neptune lasts 165 Earth years’!

Lèo, aged 4

Martha, aged 8

Things filled with air, like balloons or boats, don’t sink in water because the air inside them is less dense than water. This creates something called buoyancy. The water pushes up on the object with a force that’s stronger than the object’s weight. As long as an object is less dense than the water, it will float! This is why big ships can float even though they’re heavy – they have lots of air inside them, making them less dense overall than the water around them.

Esther, aged 10

enamel badges Y’s Wonder Club Badges Collectable for you to earn!

Help local wildlife to earn your Wildlife Watcher badge.

Investigate scientific questions to earn your Super Scientist badge.

Help save the planet to earn your Eco Hero badge.

E

Hi Y, What would happen if you removed the oxygen from the ocean? Would it turn into acid or gas?

Toby, aged 10 If you removed all the oxygen from the ocean, the oxygen dissolved in the water would escape as a gas into the air.

The oxygen dissolved in the ocean (O₂ gas) is separate from the oxygen in H₂O (water molecules), so removing dissolved oxygen wouldn’t affect the water itself. The ocean wouldn’t turn into gas or acid, but removing oxygen would cause big changes. Without it, marine life like fish would suffocate, and bacteria that don’t need air would thrive, releasing toxic gases like hydrogen sulphide. As a result, the ocean would become a dangerous, inhospitable place for most life.

Mimi and Kitty, aged 8, had fun making moon sand (from Issue 112).

Oliver, aged 9, has been out using his telescope to see how many of the six planets he could spot in last month’s rare planetary alignment. Here he is lookin g at Venus, which actually appeared as a crescent through the telescope.

Siân, aged 7, has been super busy creating solar systems, testing bridges (Issue 110) and rockets (Issue 113) and constructing safaris (Issue 97) and rainforests (Issue 109). What a science superstar!

Dear Y, Why do planets orbit the Sun?

Thank you, Evelyn, aged 8 The Sun is HUGE so its strong gravity pulls in anything that comes near it, including the planets. But the reason they don’t just crash into the Sun is because they are moving really fast. Without the Sun’s gravity, the planets would just whizz off into space, but without their speed, they’d be pulled straight in. It’s this balance between the motion of the planets and the Sun’s gravitational pull that keeps them orbiting around the Sun. It’s a bit like swinging a ball on a string around you – the string acts like the Sun’s gravity, pulling the ball inward, while the ball’s motion keeps it moving forward instead of falling towards you.

Send your experiments, ideas, photos, reviews and questions to Y@whizzpopbang.com or Y, Whizz Pop Bang, Unit 7, Global Business Park, 14 Wilkinson Road, Cirencester, GL7 1YZ. Don’t forget to include your name, age and address. We can’t return any post, sorry.

Get problem solving to earn your Epic Engineer badge.

Write a report or a review to earn your Science Reporter badge.

To find out how to earn your badges, go to whizzpopbang.com/wonder-club. Schools can get Q qV involved too! Find out how here: bit.ly/39xNQ

whizzpopbang.com 31

Test your mum/ dad/ park keeper to

How much can you remember from this issue?

Test your knowledge with our super-duper quiz. Just tick the answers you think are correct, mark them using the answers on page 34 and then add up your score. If you need some help, check out the hints at the bottom of the page.

see what they know !

1

3 5 7

a) Extension springs b) Torsion springs c) Compression springs

rds What do hoopoe bi in? cover their eggs a) Soil hers

b) Tar and feat

2 4

Plants use energy from the Sun to make food.

What is this called?

If you were building a trampoline, what kind of springs would you need?

icrobial c) A smelly antim secretion

m Which health proble is caused by pollen? a) Mumps b) Pollen fever

6

c) Hay fever

What is the best way of getting to sleep, according to scientists? a) I magining a calm scene b) Counting sheep c) Listening to heavy metal music

8

a) Foodsynthesis

I’m making a hat out of the spring herbs I’ve grown.

My friends say it’s a waste of thyme!

b) Photosynthesis c) Sunsynthesis

How do tadpoles breathe underwater? a) Using their gills b) Using their lungs c) Using tiny snorkels

What three things do seeds need to grow? a) Water, oxygen and fertiliser

b) Water, oxygen and warmth

c) Water, oxygen and love

Who invented the biro?

I scored...

sófia Báll-Póínt a) Z b) J ózsef Péntek c) László Bíró

Need a hint? Find the answers by reading these pages…

1) Page 14 2) Page 8 3) Page 4 4) Page 35 5) Page 10 6) Page 6 7) Page 12 8) Page 24

1-3: Green shoots 4-6: Growing strong 7-8: Blooming brilliant!

Signs of spring

photography competition

!

IN

Spring is here and nature will soon be exploding into life!

Keep an eye out for the first signs of spring in your local area and send us a photo to be in with a chance of winning an awesome Explosive Science kit!

All photographs © Shutterstock.com

!

W

Explosive Science kit Make an amazing rocket using a chemical reaction, craft fizzy bombs, create an explosive bag, trigger a colour explosion, launch a mini rocket, pierce a balloon without popping it and more! This brilliant kit includes instructions for 28 exciting experiments. Recommended for children aged 8 and up.

WINNER Issue 113 competition winners Thank you to everyone who entered our Underground competition. The colour of the hidden gem was red. These three lucky winners will each receive an awesome crystal growing kit.

Otis Jones, aged 7½ Anya Wicklow, aged 14 John Bravo Salazar, aged 10

Send your entry to win@whizzpopbang.com with ‘Spring competition’ as the subject of your email. Alternatively, post it to Spring competition, Whizz Pop Bang, Unit 7, Global Business Park, 14 Wilkinson Road, Cirencester, GL7 1YZ. Please don’t forget to include your name, age and address. Deadline: April 8th 2025.

UK residents only. Full terms and conditions available at whizzpopbang.com. Sorry we are unable to return any post.

whizzpopbang.com 33

S E K O J When is the best time to wash your slinky?

During spring cleaning!

the What did ring du tree say e? springtim is “Well, this !” a re-leaf

Why is the letter A like a flower?

Because a B comes after it!

What season is it when you’re on a trampoline?

Springtime!

one about the e h t r ea h ou y id D ait for spring? w t n’ ld ou c o h w r gardene is plants! h t e w e h , ed it c x He was so e Page 8 – Roots and shoots puzzle

Page 11 – True/Untrue

Plant A grows from seed 4 Plant B grows from seed 3 Plant C grows from seed 1 Plant D grows from seed 2

UNTRUE: There is no scientific evidence for this. The small amount of pollen found in honey is from flowers pollinated by bees, whereas hay fever is caused by smaller, lighter grass and tree pollen that is carried by the wind, not by bees.

Page 10 – Pollen count

=12

=17

=12

1) A daffodil 2) The rain 3) With a G

Pollen-avoiding tips for hay fever sufferers:

A-a-a-choooo! Pollen may be vital for the planet, but it’s a big problem for hay fever sufferers. Could science solve the problem?

What is hay fever?

A tingling nose, a snot tsunami, unstoppable sneezing and itchy, watering eyes… the symptoms of hay fever are hard to ignore.

It’s an allergic reaction to tiny allergens in the air. For some sufferers, it’s like having a really bad cold for months at a time. It can stop you from sleeping and concentrating at school. Hay fever can be especially tough for people who already have asthma or eczema.

Hay fever affects up to

What causes hay fever?

Hay fever is a type of allergic rhinitis (an inflammation inside the nose) caused by pollen. In spring and summer, the air is full of microscopic tree and grass pollen.

For most people it’s not a problem. But when a hay fever sufferer breathes in pollen, their immune system goes on red alert! Antibodies in your blood attach to the pollen and flag it up. In response, your cells release chemicals, such as histamine, to fight the ‘invader’.

These chemicals make the lining of your nose and throat produce extra mucus.

what about

treatments?

Doctors can prescribe medicines, such as antihistamines and decongestants, but they don’t work for everyone.

Scientists think that pollen tablets might be more promising.

Pollen tablets?

But pollen causes hay fever!

The idea is that patients are given small amounts of pollen over a long stretch of time. This makes their immune system less sensitive, and more likely to ignore pollen in future. It’s a type of immunotherapy that aims to change the body’s immune system, rather than fighting it.

one in four people in the UK

Pollen count How many pollen grains can you count?

Check your answer on page 34.

10 whizzpopbang.com

Eating honey produced by local bees has the same effect as taking pollen tablets Answer on page 34

Page 20 – Petal puzzler

Page 19 – Riddles

SPOTLIGHT

Hay Fever

Answers

Scientists in Japan are investigating whether rice could be genetically modified to contain tiny amounts of pollen allergens. Just like pollen tablets, this could train the immune system to stop overreacting to pollen and help people with hay fever feel better.

whizzpopbang.com 11

Page 25 – Doodle puzzle Line d leads to the ballpoint pen.

Page 32 – Quiz 1) a 2) b 3) c 4) a 5) c 6) b 7) a 8) c

JELLY BABIES One of the first signs of spring is frogspawn appearing in ponds and streams. These clusters of jelly blobs are frogs’ eggs, and each black dot is a developing tadpole. If you find some frogspawn, keep checking it over the next couple of weeks and you might be able to see the tadpoles developing inside the jelly and eventually wriggling their way out. But don’t handle or move the frogspawn as you might accidentally spread diseases that can harm them.

R A L U C A T C E SP

e c n e i c s

GIANT CRYSTAL CAVE

© Patrick C Fox / Shutterstock.com

This incredible cave in Mexico contains some of the biggest crystals ever found – the largest is about 12 m long, 4 m across and weighs 55 tons! The cave is 300 metres below the ground in an area called Naica, which lies on an ancient fault in the Earth’s crust and above an underground magma chamber. The Tadpoles are aquatic – they have gills to allow them to breathe underwater, giant selenite crystals formed over like fish. Through April and May, the tadpoles will undergo amazing changes about 500,000 years because of a reaction called metamorphosis as they develop into frogs. First they will grow back between hot groundwater containing legs, then arms, and then their tails will be slowly absorbed into their bodies. sulphide and cool surface water.

They will also develop lungs, allowing them to breathe out of water.

Grow a fire snake using sugar

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