natural history (species)

Owls

Field of view

Jagged ambush bug

• ambush predators

• Prey on pollinators

• Has a proboscis

Horsehair worm

• parasitoid

• Feeds on insects

Trematodes (flukes)

• endoparasites of vertebrates

Chipping sparrows/songbirds

Field of view

Mallard duck

Field of view

American bullfrog

• Field of view

• Startle response (sound)

White tailed deer

• field of view

• Independently moving pinna

• Rectangular pupils

• Alarm bradycardia

• Find patches of conifers to stay warm in the winter because they block the wind

• In the winter they eat along the shoreline and create a browse line (can’t cache because they have bad memory and it is difficult for them to move in the snow).

• If it is too difficult to move in the snow they will reduce their activity and rely on fat reserves

• Tend to use the same trails in the winter to avoid losing energy

American woodcock

Field of view

Whirligig beetles

• have 2 sets of eyes

Deer mouse

• Large pinna

• Countershading

Little brown bats

• echolocation

Owlet moths/ Greater red dart moths

• finely tuned ears

Water flea (daphnia)

• vertical migration due to kairomones

Physid snails

• kairamones

Gray tree frog

• background matching

• Disruptive colouration

• Aposematic colouration or startle colouration (bright colour only legs only revealed when they are stretched)

• freeze tolerant

Carolina grasshopper

• Background matching

• Startle response (bright colour)

American Bittern

• background matching

Red winged blackbird (female)

• background matching

Vesper sparrow

• background matching

Green frog

• Disruptive colouration

• startle response (sound)

Northern leopard frog

• disruptive colouration

Massasauga rattlesnake

• Disruptive coloration

• venomous

Eastern milk snake

• disruptive colouration

Canada goose

• disruptive colouration (chin strap)

Killdeer

-disruptive colouration

Red eyed vireo

• disruptive colouration

• migratory song bird

• Long distance migrant

Raccoons

• masks

Wood frog

• masks

• In they winter they go underground but not deep enough to escape freezing

• Freeze tolerant

Common yellowthroat

• masks

Largemouth bass

• aquatic countershading

Water boatman

• aquatic countershading

Backswimmer

• Aquatic countershading (reverse)

Eastern chipmunk

• countershading

• Hibernate (sorta)

• Cycles through periods of arousal and torpor (shorter torpor period and longer arousal period)

• Stash food for the winter

Giant swallowtail butterfly

• Masquerade

Inchworm

• Masquerade

Walking stick

• Masquerade

Pearly Wood nymph

• masquerade

Beavers

• make their own hiding place

• a particularly thick underfur

• has a waterproof Pelage

• builds lodges (type of roost)

• larder hoarder (makes food piles)

Musk rat

• has a dense underfur

• Has a waterproof Pelage

• builds lodges out of vegetation (type of roost)

Minks

• has a dense underfur

• Has a waterproof Pelage

Eastern tent caterpillars

• make their own hiding place

Caddisfly larva

• Decorating behaviour

Bagworm

• decorating behaviour

Warty leaf beetle larva

• decorating behaviour

Dark fishing spider

Autonomy of legs

Hairstreak butterfly

• False head

Five lined skink

• caudal autonomy

Underwing moth

• startle response (bright colour)

IO moths

Startle response (eyespots)

Polyphemus moth

Startle response (eyespots)

Canadian tiger swallowtail caterpillar

• startle responses (eyespots and osmeteria)

Canadian tiger swallowtail butterfly

• Engages in puddling

Pandora sphinx moth caterpillar

• eyespots

Spotted turtle

Armour (carapace)

Blanding turtle

• armour (carapace)

• Unique shell hinge that allows it to hide completely in its shell

Northern map turtle

• armour (carapace)

• No shell ‘hinge’ so it is easier for small predators to get in

• escape freezing by going under water (they use their skin to absorb oxygen from the water)

• delayed emergence (hatchlings are freeze resistant)

Mollusks

• armour (calcium carbonate/ aragonite layer)

North American Porcupine

• have quills as a defence mechanism

• Cannot shoot their quills but they have a detach mechanism once they stick in something

• Aposematic colouration, not toxic but have quills

• Find roosting sites(hollow trees or rock crevices)

• can determine which plants within the same species (trembling aspens) produce more secondary metabolites (tannins and phenolic acid). They leave signs of their feeding activities in the form of claw marks and snipped branches

Pumpkinseed sunfish

• spines as a defense mechanism

• Spines are often located on the dorsal fin, pelvic fin, anal fin

• Not venomous

Catfish (yellow bullhead and brown bullhead)

• spines on their dorsal and pectoral fins

• venomous

Northern Madtom Catfish

• has spines

• Has the ability to ‘lock’ its pectoral spine bones in place, this makes it dangerous and more difficult for predators to swallow them, because it makes them bigger

• venomous

Channel catfish

• venomous catfish with spines

IO moth caterpillar

• Venomous, but only uses its venom for defensive purposes

• Has spines

• Aposematic

Spiny oak slug moth caterpillar

• has spines

• Venomous, only used for self defense

Milkweed Tussock moth caterpillar

• fine hairs that release venom

• Venomous, only self defense

• Aposematic

Wasps

• use their venom to kill prey

• apitoxin

• Aposematic

Honey bees

• uses venom for self defense

• Apitoxin

• Sting autonomy, stinger can continue to deliver more compounds in the prey. It can also release pheromones that can attract more bees (can help them takedown larger predators). Its is also lethal for a bee

• Kamikaze behaviour (sacrifice themselves for the hive)

• Aposematic

Blister beetle

• poisonous

• Cantharidin (only male produces it, but they give some to the female to use for self defense)

American toad

• poisonous

• Produce toxins through glands on their backs

• Bufotoxin

Eastern newt/ red spotted newt

• tetrodotoxin (ttx)

• Aposematic (red eft stage)

• Poisonous

Monarch (caterpillar)

• Aposematic

• poisonous

• Cardiac glycosides

• unaffected by the cardiac glycosides because their sodium potassium pumps are slightly different so the cardiac glycosides cannot bind to it and inactivate it

• To deal with the sticky latex, younger caterpillars engage in trenching

• To deal with latex older caterpillars cut major vessels (petiole) so that the latex cannot flow through the leaf

• Caterpillars accumulate the cardiac glycosides and use them for their own defense (older ones purposely drink the latex)

Monarch butterfly

• cardiac glycosides

• Poisonous

• Aposematic

• long distance migratory insect (multigenerational)

Aphids

• Aposematic

• poisonous

• feed on the phloem of plants

• Have a partnership with a certain type of bacteria to get amino acids (this bacteria is passed down generation to generation)

• Excrete honeydew

Red milkweed beetle

• poisonous

• Aposematic

American giant millipede

• Aposematic

• Benzoquinone

• poisonous

Black and gold flat millipede

• Relaxed hydrogen cyanide gas through glands

• Poisonous

• Aposematic

Striped skunk

• Aposematic colouration and display (raise their tail and stomp on the ground

Pickerel frog

• Aposematic colouration or startle colouration (bright colour only legs only revealed when they are stretched)

Dogbane tiger moth

• uses sounds to advertise their toxicity (against bats, produces clicks to tell them they are toxic)

• Acoustic aposematic display

• Toxic

Prairie rattlesnake

• acoustic Aposematic display (rattle their tail)

Hover flies

• batesian mimicry

Locust borrer beetle

• batesian mimicry

Bee mimic flower beetle

• Batesian mimicry

• Back of the beetle looks like a bee head

Brittle Prickly Pear cactus

-has spines

Hawthorn

• has long and pointy thorns

Roses

• have prickles

Prickly ash

• a shrub with prickles

• secondary metabolite : limonene ( a part of a larger group of chemicals called terpenoids), they can be toxic or very distasteful if ingested

Great Mullein

• Leaves are covered with trichomes, making it difficult for insects to walk on them or for insects to the reach the tissues of the leaves to either feed or lay their eggs

Great Stinging Nettle

• toxic trichomes (glandular trichomes)

• Female plants produce more trichomes than male plants, this may be because females need to defend their offsprings

• induced defenses

Scouringrush horsetail

• 25% of the plant is made of silica

• Considers silica accumulators because they can accumulate really large amounts of silica in their tissues

Grasses

• silica accumulators

Skunk cabbage

• manufacture crystals of calcium oxalate (called raphides)

• The raphides are stored in special components called ideoblasts

Broad leaf trees (like oaks)

• secondary metabolites: tannins

• Deters predators like porcupines

Eastern red cedars

• secondary metabolite: cedrol (a terpenoid)

Milkweed

• secondary metabolite: cardiac glycosides (highly toxic to most animals because they mess up the sodium potassium pump in memebrane)

• Cardiac glycosides can impact the sodium potassium pump by binding to the pump and stopping it from functioning

• Also has latex, a sticky and toxic substance that can ooze out of injured tissue

Eastern white pine

• resin

Conifers (pines, spruces, larches, firs)

• oleoresin (also called resin)

• Resin contains many different compounds like terpenoids

Balsam Fir

• resin stored in blisters on its bark

Poison Ivy

• uses resin as a defence

• Its resin contains an active chemical compound called Urushiol

• often grows vertically and show negative phototropism