Ecology 217 Assignments

Homework and Other Assignments

Date Assigned Description Due Date
Jan 13 Career Assignment Feb 1
Jan 18 Seasnake water relations reading assignmentReading available here:

http://www.naturalhistorymag.com/features/081302/a-long-drink-of-water

Feb 8
Jan 20 Muddiest Point Assignment- CHAPTER 7. DUE Monday Jan  24 at NOON

After reading Chapter 7 (Energy), identify one important point that was unclear (muddy) to you. Write out and send to me a sentence or two that explains which concept is muddy, what is muddy about it, and why this concept is important.  DO NOT use questions such as will this be on the test? Your muddy points should concern concepts that are important for understanding.  You are always welcome to ask questions about exam coverage, but not for credit!

Send your assignment to me (email: rjm2@uakron.edu, put the words MUDDIEST POINT in the subject line; or drop off at my office ASEC E508).   MAKE SURE TO INCLUDE YOUR NAME, so I can record your score. For email,  no attachments please  just put the answer in the body of the email.

I will summarize these responses and prepare a part of our class for Tuesday and Thursday based on your responses.

If you have more than one muddy point you would like to have addressed, you may do so, but please clearly identify the one that is most muddy.

If nothing is muddy to you, then choose a point you thought was important or interesting, and explain why you think that.

Scoring. 3 marks possible:

Jan 24
Feb 24 Muddy Point Assignment- Population Growth. DUE Monday Feb 28, NOON

After reading Chapter 11,  identify one important point that was unclear (muddy) to you (if you have problems with survivorship or life tables (last part of Chapter 10), send those as well). Write out and send to me a sentence or two that explains which concept is muddy, what is muddy about it, and why this concept is important.  DO NOT use questions such as will this be on the test? Your muddy points should concern concepts that are important for understanding. If nothing is muddy to you, then choose a point you thought was important or interesting.

Send your assignment to me (email: rjm2@uakron.edu, put the words MUDDIEST POINT in the subject line; or drop off at my office ASEC E508; or my mailbox in the biology office). . For email,  no attachments please just put the answer in the body of the email.

I will summarize these responses and prepare a part of our class based on your responses.

If you have more than one muddy point you would like to have addressed, you may do so, but please clearly identify the one that is most muddy.

Scoring. as before

Feb 28
Mar 3 Movie assignment.                           Due March 22.                      20 points

In class you watched two movies: Return of the Cuyahoga, and Kingdom of the Seahorse

For BOTH movies, do the following (that is, answer thethree questions for the Cuyahoga movie, and ALSO for the Seahorse movie):

  1. Develop a scientific hypothesis related to one of the topics raised in the movie. What sort of information, observations, or experiments could help evaluate this hypothesis? (Note: be careful that this is a SCIENTIFIC hypothesis that can be answered with data, not a vague explanation that cannot be definitively evaluated).
  2. Explain one thing that you learned from this movie that was exciting or interesting to you.
  3. Find an ECOLOGICAL research article from the primary literature (one that reports data, methods and results) that is related to this movie.
  4. Give the full citation for the article (Author, year, article title journal, volume, page numbers)
  5. Explain how it is connected to the movie. You don’t have to read the whole journal article, but skim it and then tell me what new things you learned.

The “primary literature” refers to journals that report the results of original scientific research. For this exercise, please choose from among these journals that focus on ecological topics Ecology, Ecology Letters, Oikos, Oecologia , Journal of Ecology, Journal of Animal Ecology, Functional Ecology, Ecosystems, Molecular Ecology, Evolutionary Ecology, Population Ecology, Journal of Chemical Ecology, Journal of Applied Ecology, Plant Ecology, Global Change Biology, Global Ecology and Biogeography, Ecological Entomology, Ecological Research, American Naturalist

These sources are available in the Library’s ‘Electronic Journal Center’ online (http://journals.ohiolink.edu/cgi-bin/sciserv.pl?collection=journals) (or go to www.uakron.edu/library, and click on ‘electronic resources’, then on ‘electronic journals’, then on ‘electronic journal center’.

Your article MUST be from one of these journals, or you must request special permission. It should also be a research article (with original data), not a review or summary of the work of others.

Citations: Use this format:  Author(s), year. Article title. Journal Volume:pages.

For example:

Mitchell, RJ, JD Karron, KG Holmquist, JM Bell. 2004. The influence ofMimulus ringens floral display size on pollinator visitation patterns.Functional Ecology 18:116-124.

Mar 22
Mar 22 Muddiest Point Assignment- Competition. DUE Wednesday March 23, NOON

After reading Chapter 13, identify one important point that was unclear (muddy). Write out and send to me a sentence or two that explains which concept is muddy, what is muddy about it, and why this concept is important.  DO NOT use questions such as will this be on the test? Your muddy points should concern concepts that are important for understanding. If nothing is muddy to you, then choose a point you thought was important or interesting.

Send your assignment to me (email: rjm2@uakron.edu, put the words MUDDIEST POINT in the subject line; or drop off at my office  ASEC 177; or my mailbox in the biology office). . For email,  no attachments please  just put the answer in the body of the email.

I will summarize these responses and prepare a part of our class for Thursday and after spring break based on your responses.

If you have more than one muddy point you would like to have addressed, you may do so, but please clearly identify the one that is most muddy.

Mar 23
Mar 22 Age Structure and Population Growth (click to see pdf) Mar 28
Apr 5 Predation Assignment  (click to see pdf)  April 21