Daisy Magic
By Joanne Linden

With their sunny polka-dot centers and bright white petals, there’s no doubt about it: daisies are the official flowers of spring. But wouldn’t it be fun to have daisies of different colors? With a little effort and some scientific magic, you can!

What you need:

• 3 tall water glasses
• Red, yellow, and blue food coloring
• Water
• Fresh-cut daisies (from the field or flower shop)
• An apron or old shirt to protect your clothes
• Old newspapers to cover the table
• Rubber gloves to protect your hands from staining

Directions:

1. Fill each glass 1/3 full of water.
2. Add food coloring, one color to each glass, making a strong solution.
3. Put a few fresh daisies in each glass.
4. Let them sit in the solution for several hours—overnight is best. (The longer the daisies sit in the solution, the darker their color.)

The daisy stems act like a straw, sucking up the colored water and turning the white flowers to pink, light yellow, and blue. This happens through a process called osmosis. The colored liquid moves from the glass up through membranes in the stem to reach the flower petals.

Cool idea: Experiment to see how many different colors of daisies you can make by mixing different shades of food coloring together. For example, red and blue will produce a purple daisy!