Mrs. Dorothy Retallack is a perfectly pleasant American lady who kills plants. She does it by playing rock music for them. When Mrs. Retallack went to college, most of her classes were in music. But she also took a science course. To pass in science she had to do some tests with plants. Her thought she should try experiments teacher using music What in the world can you do with music and asked Mrs. Retallack. Then she had an idea she would play music or plants. she planted seed, in small cups, each filled with the same kind of soil. She planted both garden and house plants some vege- tables and some flowers when the plants started to grow, Mrs. Retallack divided them: 10 nto groups of five. She placed these groups of pants in big closed cabinet on wheels All the plants were put on the same watering schedule. The light, heat, and air were kept the same in all the cabinets. between the cabi The only difference ets was sound, or the lack of it. At one side of each cabinet was a loudspeaker. Throu sound would be sent to the group of 12 plants inside. Inside only one of the cabinets the plants would grow in silence Mrs. Retallack started her tests with piano tones. She gave some plants long ses- sions of these tones. They leaned away from the loudspeaker. Then they collapsed. three weeks all were dead. But plants that had piano tones for just a short time grew 13 well For the second test Mrs. Retallack used music from two different radio stations. One station played rock music. The other played soft music and hymns The group of plants receiving the rock station would not grow. The petunias in the group would not bloom. In month all plants given rock music were dead. The plants given soft music were strong and healthy. The petunias among them had lovely blooms. The plants growing in silence were straight and well. But they were not a lush or strong-rooted as plants given soft music 9_ When she saw what had happened, Mrs Retallack began to wonder what other people had found out about sound and plants. She learned that in India scientists tried to increase plant yield with music In Canada sounds of a high pitch had seemed e States, when scientists had broadcast city to help the growth of wheat. In the United noise to plants, their growth was cut almo in half. Another experimenter in the United States had found that plants seem to be able to show fear, worry, and even love. m 10 Because of her hard work Mrs. Retallack passed in science with high marks. And she kept on thinking about music and plants She had always believed that music pt could heal and noise could hurt. After seeing what music did to plants, she wanted to learn more. She made up her mind to spend the rest of her life studying what sound can do to plants and to people Mrs. Retallack had seen that some sounds seemed to help plants. She felt that maybe there were sounds that would help eople. She had seen that soft music seemed to be better for plants than complete silence. She thought perhaps there could be blends of musical notes that would strengthen people at improve their growth. and heal their ill nesses If there really are such sounds. whoever finds them will do the world a great service One Perhaps in the future many others will join studying the effects of sound Mrs. Retallack, on people and playing music for plants!