It's Time To Go Ice Fishing!

Okay, I'm not referring to actual ice fishing where one goes onto an ice covered pond, drills a hole, and fishes.  I'm referring to the literal fishing of ice!  This was a cool little science experiment my daughters and I did the other day.  You start by filling two glasses of ice water.  Take a string and drop it into one of the glasses.  Now pull the string out.  Does any ice come out with the string?  No.

Now take the second glass and stir in a few spoonfuls of salt.  Once the salt has dissolved, drop a string into the glass, on top of the ice.  Wait a minute or two and slowly pull the string out.  Does any ice come with it?  It should!  You can see this from our image below.

What's happening here?  The salt in the water changes the freezing temperature of the water.  When the string gets wet and is placed on the ice, it 'freezes' to the ice.  When the string is slowly pulled out, ice cubes come with it!

This is a great experiment to shows your kids the effect salt has on water.  Give it a try yourself!