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Ecology Lab Report

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Ecology is the study of interaction between living organisms and nonliving environmental factors. The objective of the study is to determine the forest ecology of the Manor House by calculating the density, size, and diversity of the woodlot (Biology 214 Laboratory Handout). Diversity is the degree of the variability among the living organisms. It is important to study diversity because a larger variability of within a community will promote the productivity of an ecosystem. In addition, the knowledge of the number of individual organisms present in a population is important to ecologists.
Many methods exist to quantify the numbers of individual organisms in a specific area. It is important to chose a measuring method that is most practical for the sampling area. The point-quarter technique, developed by Cottan and Curtis, is widely used to estimate the area covered by an organism based on random samplings on specific areas. The sample area is chosen at random along a transect, relying on the random distribution of organisms in the area. From the random point, the area is divided into four quadrants and the point-to-plant distance is measured. From this measurement, species density, diversity and importance value can be calculated. Khan and his colleagues (2016) investigated the discrepancy and accuracy of …show more content…

I hypothesize that the forest woodlot will have moderate density, size, and diversity. Before measuring the characteristics of the woodlot, I observed that the forest was not densely populated and the organisms were spaced apart evenly throughout the forest. However, I predicted that the transects deeper into the forest, 50 feet, would show more diversity than the transects at 25 feet because the forest centralizes deeper into the forest and is less disturbed, which results in a wider diversity of the

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