Week 12 Community Ecology Homework 2023

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University of British Columbia *

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121 - 003

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Biology

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Jan 9, 2024

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docx

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Biol 121 123 Homework Week 12 2023 Rhinoceros Oxpecker Tick Q1. Oxpeckers are small birds from east Africa. They feed on what they can collect from the skin of large plant-eating mammals like the white rhinoceros (rhino). This diet is believed to include ticks. Ticks eat blood from wounds they create in the skin of rhinos, and often transfer diseases to the rhinos via the wounds they create. Ticks need to eat blood to stay alive and to reproduce. ( 7 marks total ) Q1a) Based only on the information provided above, explain the nature of each interaction below by indicating the direct effect of the interaction on the fitness of “organism 1” in the left-most column. Also indicate your reason for suspecting how the interaction affects the fitness of “organism 1”. ( 4 marks ) Organism 1 Direct interaction with: Outcome of interaction for organism 1. (circle one) Reason Rhino Oxpecker + - 0 Rhino Tick + - 0 Oxpecker Rhino + - 0 Tick Oxpecker + - 0
Biol 121 123 Homework Week 12 2023 Q1b) Oxpeckers are also known to regularly eat rhino blood and other tissue taken from open wounds created by ticks or from other injuries. Scientists tested the impact of oxpeckers on the wounds of large mammals using an experiment where oxpeckers were either included or excluded from fields at three sites that contained oxen, another large plant-eating mammal (and a substitute for rhinos). Each month, the scientists counted the number of ticks and wounds on each ox. The average number of ticks was similar for all fields and sites; the average number of wounds is shown in Figure 6. 6c) Briefly describe the overall pattern shown on the graph ( 1 mark ) 6d) Based on this new information, what type of species interaction might be occurring between the oxpecker and rhino? Support your argument with evidence from the graph above. ( 2 marks ) Figure 6: Number of wounds per oxen in the presence or absence of oxpecker birds. Oxpeckers present Oxpeckers absent
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