Carrying out this project has been a bit of an eye-opening experience. I figured that my project would be relatively simple, and to a degree it was – just monitoring the growth of weeds in an empty patch of garden in my backyard. However, as I went along, I realized that there was still plenty to keep track of. I abstained from watering anywhere near that area in an effort to keep as much in my control as possible, but there were still plenty of other variables to consider. Shade levels and time of growth were the only variables I was actively monitoring in relation to percent cover, but precipitation and fallen pine needles in the dirt also likely played a large role. I also had to change to I gathered my percent cover data, going from purely visual estimation to a 40x40cm. quadrat for (hopefully) more accurate data. Even in these small-scale experiments there are countless potential sources of error and things that can affect data in unforeseen ways. For large-scale ecological projects such as monitoring a species of bird within a protected reserve to get an idea of the population number and density, there has to be such a high degree of setup and attention to detail to ensure that the data taken is accurate. Considering how complex ecological studies can be, especially in comparison to mine, I have gained quite a bit of appreciation for the effort that it takes to perform these experiments and develop theories using data gathered from them. Even seemingly mundane topics may turn out to have a deceptive level of depth the further the topic is studied, considering the sheer amount of ecological interactions that are present everywhere in the wild. It is nearly impossible to account for all of these, so the fact that we have developed ecological theories that prove to be sound despite all these potentially unknown interactions and variables is nothing short of impressive.