Percipitation Levels and the Affects to Beak Size Essay

Therefore there was a recorded 8 birds, 1 dove, 5 magpie goose and 2 pacific black duck, 3 weeks after the floods. By 2017 the total of 8 birds, 3 species have now increased to a total of 25 birds, 6 species in 4 years. Though this being said many of the birds are ‘new’ to the area such as the 15 Cotton pygmy Geese and 4 recorded Dusky Moorhen. 6 bird species were seen/recorded in 2017, these being the 2 Black cormorant, 1 pacific black duck, Cotton pygmy, Dusky moorhen, little egret and willie wagtail. Other bird species such as the magpie goose which had a number of 41 recorded in 2009, 5 in 2013 and now 0. This indicates that the diversity of birds and population has decreased as a result of their habitat loss and or an a adequate supply of food.

Some finches inherited longer beaks, this allowed them to open more seeds and access more food. Inheriting the longer beaks is not proven, but any animal inherited traits just like humans. So gathering this information we can conclude that they inherit their long beaks. Having a long beak was crucial in order for the finches to survive through the drought. Two finches, for example, that survived the drought, had bigger beak sizes. Gf69 had a beak length of 13.01 millimeters and weighed 13.41 grams. Another finch that survived the drought had a beak length of 10.97 and weighed about 12 grams. Yet a finch that didn’t survive had a beak length of 9.92 millimeters. All 10 finches that survived through the drought had longer beaks that averaged to 11.939 millimeters. This is a large beak size compared to a bird that did not survive with a beak length of 7.21 millimeters. A bigger beak length allows a finch to pry open harder seeds unlike the finches with smaller beaks. Some field notes were taken from the Grants, and they told us that a finch was spotted struggling to open a seed. For this reason finches with longer beaks were able to get food more easily than finches with smaller beaks. In conclusion, some finches had a longer lifespan than other for the reason that they had longer beaks. On top of that they were able to survive the

Darwin has listed different names for each bird, they are all variations of Finches, apparently descended from a common ancestor. However, each bird has a different length beak and many are differently shaped to allow them to more efficiently eat the available fodder. Coincidentally, Mr. Darwin failed to catalog specifically where each bird came from and had to ask the ship’s captain to supply this information along with his collection to Mr. Gould for identification and cataloging. An interesting part of the conversation between Mr. Darwin and the ship’s captain is the captain’s argument for the fixity of species, that each one was created by God exactly the way it was, and placed on each island, and that it is heresy to say that they came to be there any other way.

Assignments 1: I developed a hypothesis to predict that the island with the finches with the larger beak will be able to adapt more rapidly to their surrounding and handle the hard seeds of their island verses the island with the finches with the smaller beaks. I left the primary beak size on Darwin

Over the last several years, evolution has been playing an increasingly important role in determining how various species are evolving. This is because ecology will have an impact on how quickly a particular organism is able to adapt (with: the unique challenges for a particular environment). To determine the effect that this is having requires carefully examining different species over the course of many years. This will be accomplished by comparing these changes on Darwin and Wallace Islands. Once this occurs, is when specific insights will be provided that are highlighting the underlying challenges affecting the development of organisms. This is the point that these transformations will be evident among the various life forms. (Fasolo, 2011, pp. 53 68)

In the article “Climate change in Hawaii and U.S Tropical islands” written by EPA, informs the audience that island communities and ecosystems face uncertainty as a result of the negative effects brought on by one of the most controversial topics debated today. Climate change. Islands, like Hawaii, Guam, and the Caribbean, are most vulnerable to the harsh effects of climate change. The reason for this is because islands are small and the way their infrastructures are set up make communities almost directly affected. One of the most important things that are affected is the weather. In areas where precipitation was generous, rainfall is actually decreasing while drier areas see an increase in rainfall. Less precipitation also means less available water resources because

The Beak of the Finch by Jonathan Weiner explores evolution through the most famous examples in history—the finches of the Galápagos Islands. Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection and the process of evolution are applied directly to what scientists refer to as Darwin’s Finches. Weiner follows scientists Peter and Rosemary Grant as they study the finches in real time on the Galápagos. Years of previous work, study and data is collected and analyzed. Different species of animals are observed and explained throughout history. The Grants have one goal, and that is to find the origin of the species, how organisms first began. They find that it really is about the “survival of the

The tendency towards more intense precipitation events is projected to the future. The more precipitation, the more risk of flooding.More heavy downpours may increase the likelihood of property damage, travel delays and disruption in

One of its most important characteristics is its beak. The finch adapted to have a thin, long beak to probe through moss, bark and leaves in search of food (Wildscreen Arkive, N.D.). These finches have the thinnest beak out of the 13 finches; which aids them to find small insects. The Green Warbler finch are mostly found in humid highland forest where their primary food source is found. These adaptations made them more fit to survive on available food. Over the years the finch’s beak has evolved as the bird developed different taste for insects. Another famous adaptation is how they camouflage in their environment. The Green Warbler is restricted to the forest and is greener in body colouration, while the Gray Warbler is found in shrubby, dry thickets and is greyer and duller looking (Certhidea olivacea, 2010). Their coloration helps them camouflage in their own environments, and to hide from predators. Recent studies have found that there are in fact two separate species of the Warbler Finch, the Green Warbler Finch and the Grey Warbler Finch, but are considered as a single species (Wildscreen Arkive, N.D.). The Green Warbler finch mainly occupies larger, inner islands, while the Grey Warbler finch inhabits the smaller, outer islands (Green Warbler Finch,

In 1977 a drought reduced the number of small seeds available for the birds, forcing them to rely on larger seeds and nuts, which were difficult for birds with smaller beaks to open. The number of birds unable to eat reduced as they died and gave way to harder beaked finches. Within a couple of generations they had evolved larger beaks. In 2003 another drought struck the Galapagos and as there were many large beaked finches, the food source of nuts dwindled, making the ability to eat smaller seeds an asset. The numbers of larger beaked birds dwindled as food became scarce, leaving the smaller birds to survive and reproduce. Darwin’s theory was not well received when first written in On the Origin of Species, though many scientists today use it as a basis for research in evolution.

Local climate data for each site compiled for the years 1908-2007. The climatic data necessary for site-specific climate calculations were obtained from, Planning tool for Resource Integration, Synchronization, and Management (PRISM), which provides grid-based estimates over time scales in question, Northwest Alliance for Computational Science and Engineering (NACSE). It was found that talus properties provide climate-buffering effects for pikas. Elevation was included as a covariate because it often varies with suite of environmental variables (Millar & Westfall 2010). Models represented the following hypotheses: pika persistence is related to the severity of changes in temperature and precipitation since initial pika detection. The pika are

Darwin described some of the Craters, surmounting the larger islands that are of immense size, and they rise to a height between three and four thousand feet. The Crates consists of lava and their flanks are studded by innumerable small orifices. As the island is placed directly under the equator, the climate is far from being excessively hot. The rain is very irregular and it very little rain whenever it happens. So, the lowlands of the island are very sterile and unable to produce any vegetation. On the other hand, the highlands of the island are at a height of a thousand feet and upwards, which possess a moist climate and tolerant exuberant vegetation. Especially in the windwards sides of the island, they receive and condense the moisture

Some reasons why beaks were thought to be so useful for testing Darwin’s theory of natural selection was because it seemed that the more favorable variations in their beaks will be passed down. Another reason was because there were more variations in the beaks depending what the finches ate so he could study a variety of beaks.

While on the Galápagos Islands, Darwin kept notebooks about all the species there, and he noticed the variety of tortoises on the island who were essential in explaining his theory of evolution. There are several species of tortoise present on the Galápagos Islands that are all very closely related, but slightly different. There are eleven presently surviving subspecies of Galápagos tortoises; furthermore, six of the eleven are found on different islands in the archipelago, and the other five are all found on a single island on five separate volcanoes with their own mini-ecosystems (PNAS). Although all of the species of Galápagos tortoise is different, they each have small differences that can include maximum adult size, shell shape, and the length of the neck and limbs. The tortoises of the islands are most closely related to the Chaco tortoises along the western coast of South America, and they most likely came to the Galápagos by “rafting” across the water (PNAS). Similar to the tortoises, Darwin observed that the Finches on the islands also had changed to match the environment. Spread among the islands were fourteen subspecies of finch whose

to determine differences (if any) in densities of native and non-native birds relative to the type of vegetation present. Two native vegetation areas and two non-native vegetation areas were studied (i.e. four areas in total).