GERMS!

It's been a long standing debate in our house.  Do dogs or humans have cleaner mouths?  Well, we FINALLY know the answer to this question, maybe?! 

 My middle two kids, J and A, have a science fair project due this month.  I found this great tutorial over at The Kitchen Pantry Scientist's Blog on how to make your own bacteria growth plates from common kitchen ingredients!  How exciting is that? 

 I remember as a kid (ya know, back in the day when there were not so many regulations and safety rules) when I would go to the lab (in the basement of the hospital) with my mom, who was a lab tech, and watch her work.  I remember ASKING to have her draw my blood at about the age of 6-9ish (I know, crazzzzzzzzzzy) so I could test it on the machines and look at it under the microscope.  The petrie dishes with red gel were especially fun.  Mom would draw pictures in them with the specimen and then see what would grow!  It is one of my fondest memories of my mom and I. 

Back to the experiment.  We decided on testing one girl, one boy, a dog and a cat.  We gathered up all the supplies and made our DIY bacteria growth plates.  I threw them in the fridge, and life happened.  I forgot about them for a few days ( ok, ok, a week).  I went to pull them out when mom was here, since she is the expert in all of this anyhow, and found that they had frozen!  You could see the crystals forming and all!  We let them sit out for a bit to thaw.  

We hypothesized about which one would grow the most germs.  The dog does eat cat doo-doo and lick her own rear, so we thought perhaps the dog would have the dirtiest mouth of all.  Other than that we were just merely guessing.

First victim, a BOY, so innocent looking, right?  He was NOT thrilled with the swab.

 Then the dog.

 

The unsuspecting cat.  NOT THRILLED.

And last but NOT LEAST, the girl.

 

 Mom got artistic, as usual and drew a smily face with girl germs... EWW!

RESULTS!  Well, sort of.  I am unsure if the fact that they froze had something to do with it, but they seem to be liquifying, and smell just HORRENDOUS.  EW EW EW!!!

It seems, that the girl germs are growing the most, but really, we are unsure.

 We will have to do this one again, next time, and test different surfaces in the house and see if that does better, if I don't freeze them first :)