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(lab 11) lab_6_plant_ecology_and_identification

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(lab 11) lab_6_plant_ecology_and_identification

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averykotchounian
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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BIO1020

Lab 6
Introduction to Plant Ecology and Identification

Name (as displayed on Blackboard): Avery Kotchounian


Lab Section: 1B

Instructions: It is essential that you read this entire document so that you are prepared to quickly
complete the lab once we meet. You then will complete the hands-on sections and post-lab sections during
and after lab, and submit this document will all sections completed prior to the start of your next lab.

Pre-Lab Activity
Completed Individually
A. Read this BBC Future blog post about plant blindness.

B. In this pre-lab activity, you are going to take the first steps toward minimizing your own plant
blindness. In my personal opinion, one of the greatest contributors to plant blindness is the fact
that most people are confused by plants – they do not really know how plants reproduce, they are
unaware of the cool and unique adaptations of each species, and they are unable to tell one
species from another since they do not know their structures. Personally, I only started to notice
plants at the end of my freshman year in college, and I realized that I had been completely blind
to a huge portion of biodiversity I was walking past every day. The following prompts will help
you to begin to be able to recognize different plant species, and cue you in to the morphological
features that you should pay attention to when identifying a plant to species.

a. Write a few sentences below as if you were explaining the concept of plant blindness to a
relative or roommate who has not received scientific training.

Plant blindness is a term used by botanists and educators to highlight a common


phenomenon: the tendency of people to overlook or underestimate the importance
of plants in their environment. One aspect of plant blindness is the difficulty in
recognizing and remembering different plant species compared to animals. This
can be attributed to several factors, such as the stationary nature of plants, their
often-similar appearance, and the human brain's tendency to prioritize more
visually distinct objects. This often results in people having limited knowledge of
plants’ critical functions, such as producing oxygen, forming food chains,
providing medicine, and maintaining ecosystems. This lack of understanding
often results in less attention and funding for plant conservation efforts compared
to animal conservation. Addressing plant blindness involves increasing public
awareness and promoting a deeper appreciation for plants to ensure sustainable
practices.

b. Provide a specific example of how the following has likely contributed to your own plant
blindness in your everyday life as you walk around campus, your yard, etc:
“The brain is fundamentally a difference detector,” Schussler and Wandersee
explain. Because plants barely move, grow close to each other, and are often
similar in colour, our brains tend to group them together. With about 10 million
bits of visual data per second transmitted by the human retina, the human visual
system filters out non-threatening things like plants and clumps them together.”

In my daily experiences, I've noticed how the brain's natural tendency to categorize and filter
visual information has contributed to my plant blindness. For instance, when walking around my
yard with my dog, I often find myself focusing more on moving objects, such as birds flying in
the sky, or visually distinct elements rather than individual plants. If I do happen to notice a
certain plant, it is probably due to it having bright colors or patterns that stand out among other
plants. The brain's tendency to group plants together due to their stationary nature, close
proximity, and similar colors explains why I may not consciously register each plant's unique
features or significance. This phenomenon becomes particularly evident when surrounded by a
multitude of plants that blend together visually, leading to a lack of attention to their individual
characteristics.

c. Now download the iNaturalist app on your phone and create an account (it’s free). You
can also use a web browser, but we will be using this app on our phones during hands-on
lab (at least one per group).
i. Provide your username here: averykotchounian
ii. Join the Otterbein University BIO1020 iNaturalist Project

d. Visit this observation.


i. What is the scientific name of the observed species?

Asimina triloba

ii. What plant structures that we have learned about do you see in the observations?
You might need to click on them and zoom in.

1.) The leaves of the common pawpaw look large, oblong and have a
smooth texture with an alternate arrangement along the branches.
2.) The fruit of the common pawpaw is a large, greenish-yellow berry
that contains several seeds.
3.) The plant is a flowering plant, meaning it is an angiosperm

e. Click on the common name of the observation in part e, above. You will see a lot of
information about the species.

i. What is the geographic range for this species?

Its range extends as far north as the southern portion of Ontario, Canada.
Within the United States, the pawpaw is native to the eastern, southern,
and midwestern states, ranging from New York westward to southeastern
Nebraska, southward to eastern Texas and the panhandle of Florida.
ii. Is the observation within the expected geographic range?

Yes, the observation was taken in one of the more likely areas to find a common
pawpaw.

iii. Click the Plant Phenology tab on the chart. Hover over the lines on the chart and
figure out what the different colored lines indicate. When does this species flower
and fruit?

The data depicted in the graph indicates that the common pawpaw
typically flowers between March and June, reaching its peak in April with
4.07k observations of flowering. As for fruit production, the common
pawpaw's main fruiting period spans from April to October, with
September standing out as the peak month with 1.14k observations of
fruiting.

Hands-on Lab
Completed as a group
List the full names of group members:

Your group will:

1. Establish two separate 10 m x 10 m quadrats within which you will collect data. These will be
your research sites.
a. One site must be in the forest along Alum Creek and the other must be in an area
containing at least one tree along Lake Otterbein.
b. You will record the latitude and longitude at the center of each quadrant.
c. Use Google Maps to generate a figure showing the location of both of your sites, by
drawing a square on a screenshot of the map for each site.

2. Collect data:
a. Work with your group members to complete the Lab 6 Data Collection Worksheet
b. Take quality photographs of as many plant organs as you can find for each species. This
will include buds in woody plants for which leaves have not yet been produced.

In lab next week you will work to characterize the ecology of your sites using richness, evenness, and
phylogenetic measures of biodiversity. The biodiversity measures you generate next week and
information on iNaturalist about each species you discover will be used by your group to produce a short
technical report comparing your two sites. More information about this will appear in next week’s lab
assignment.

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