natural history key terms

Pinna

External ears

Ambush predators

• Predators that wait for prey to come to them

• Usually well camouflaged (at least the females are)

True bugs

• A species of bugs which are closely related to aphids

• use their proboscis to feed on the fluid of animals rather than plants

• Uses their proboscis to inject venom and their digestive enzymes inside the prey to liquify their insides for them to slurp up back through there proboscis

• Raptorial legs

Tropically transferred

• A parasite transferred through food

• Some of these parasites modify their host’s behaviour to make them more likely to be eaten by their final host (behavioural manipulation)

Echolocation

• Locating predators/objects using the reflection of sound waves

• Used by bats

Lepidopteran

• A term used to refer to moths or butterflies

• “Scaled wings”

Kairomone

A chemical left behind by another animal that an animal can use to its own benefit

Autonomy

The ability to self amputate a body part

Caudal autonomy

The ability of lizards to drop their tail

osmeterion

• A pair of fleshy appendages that stick out of the head (resembles a snake tounge)

• Specific to the swallowtail caterpillar family

Plastron

The belly of a turtle

Carapace

The back of a turtle

Mollusks

Bivalves and gastropods

Bivalves

Clams, muscles and oysters

Gastropods

Snails and slugs

Nacre

• material only mollusks can make

• Same thing as what pearls are made out of

Nacreous layer

Layer of calcium carbonate/ aragonite that is especially resistant to fracture in mollusk shells

Midden

A pile of discarded scraps by an animal

Quills

• modified hairs with barbs

• Barbs help keep them stuck in animals and also help them penetrate predators’ skin

Venomous animals

Animals that have a means to inject their toxins in either a prey or predator

Poisonous animals

• do not have a means to inject their toxins

• Generally only use their toxins as a defense mechanism, and it can only be delivered by ending up in a predator’s mouth

Hymenoptera

• bees and wasps

• ‘Clear winged insects’

Ovipositor

• A tube at the end of the abdomen that many insects use to lay their eggs

• In some species it is a stinger

• In some species it does both

Mullerian mimicry

When several species that are toxic share a similar Aposematic colouration

Batesian mimicry

Non toxic species that imitate the Aposematic colour of a toxic species

Spines

A modification of a leaf

Thorns

A modification of a stem

Prickles

• they are outgrowth of the bark

• Not modified leaves or branches

Trichomes

• Small hairs that cover the leaves of a plant

Glandular Trichomes

• a trichomes that has a gland which produces a toxin

• Toxins can be released when animals or insects touch them (works kind of like a pipette)

Herbivory

When animals eat plants

Constitutive defenses

Defences that are always part of a plant in the same amount

Induced defenses

• plant defenses that change in accordance to the level of herbivory

• a benefit because the plant only spends resources on defense when it needs it

Phytolith

• a specialized structures in silica accumulating plants that they build up silica inside

Raphides and ideoblasts

• raphides are calcium oxalate crystals

• Ideoblasts are special compartments where raphides are stored

Aposematism

Bright colour or contrast between light and dark that advertises toxicity

Structural molecules

• molecules not made primarily for defense

• They are molecules that are necessary for the plant to hold itself together

Secondary metabolites

Molecules made for thee sole purpose of deterring herbivores

Latex

• a sticky and toxic substance that can ooze out of injured tissue in some plants

• Toxic because it contains a lot of cardiac glycosides and other chemical

Ecdysis

The process by which insects molt their exoskeleton

Ecdysone

The hormone that controls ecdysis

Phytoecdysone

• Ecdysone mimic that some plant families can produce

• It can mess with the molting process in insects when they eat plants with this hormone

Proteases

Enzymes that break down proteins into amino acids

Protease inhibitors

• Prevent the breaking down of proteins into amino acids

Methyl jasmonate

A chemical produced by plants that can turn caterpillars into cannibals. It is not a secondary metabolite, it is invoked in many functions in plants.

Domatia (domatium)

• mite shelters that plants build to keep mites around

Mutualistic symbiosis

• Mutually beneficial close association between two or more species

Symbiosis

A close association between two or more species (not necessarily mutual benefits)

Petiole

A a little stalk that connects a leaf to a branch

Extrafloral nectaries

• Nectar producing glands that are not located on flowers

• Usually their function is to attract animals that will help defend the plant against other insects

Photoperiod

Day length

Zugonruhe

• migratory restlessness

hyperphagia

• a period in which birds start to feed a lot

• Many birds will double or even triple their body weight in preparation for migration

• during this time, the size of a bird’s digestive tract and liver increase to process the greater intake of food

Endotherms

• animals that generate a lot of body heat

• Most birds and mammals

Ectotherms

• most animals (except birds and mammals)

• Animals that rely on external heat sources to regulate their temperature

Pelage

Fur coat of mammals

Underfur

• Provides most of the insulation in the pelage

• thinner, shorter, curlier hairs than the guard hairs

Guard hairs

• big thick hairs in the Pelage

Roost

• Resting site

• Used in the winter by many birds and mammals to protect themselves against the elements while they are resting

Subnivean zone

• zone under the snow

• Created by the sublimation of the snow

• snow is a good insulator so the temperature is much warmer in the zone than outside

Food caching

• hoarding

• When animals hide food in the fall so they have it for the winter

• Many mammals and birds do this

• birds that cache food tend to have larger hippopotamuses than those that don’t

Scatter hoardings

Caching food all over the place

Larder hoarding

• a type of food caching

• Puts more food in fewer locations

Dormancy

• hibernation (endotherms)

• Brumation (ectotherms)

Hibernation

• animals enter a state of torpor for a few days or even weeks

• A very prolonged period of torpor

Brumation

• The ectotherm of hibernation

• The goal of Brumation is for animals to protect their cells from freezing

Torpor

a state of decreased physiological activity where animals lower their body temperature, heart rate, and metabolism to conserve energy

Browse line

Tree line on the water where everything is eaten from the bottom portion

Frost line

• about 1 m below ground

• The depth below which the water underground does not freeze in the winter

Hibernaculum

An area where an animal spends the winter

Communal hibernacula

• When several snakes use the same hibernaculum

• Many species of snakes do this (garter, gray rat, etc)

Freeze tolerant

• When an animal can tolerate having part of their body fluids frozen and still manages to keep the liquid inside their cells from freezing

Ice nucleating proteins

• Proteins that bind to ice crystals and control their formation. They make sure that they don’t get out of control and that they don’t form large/sharp crystals that could poke the cell membranes

Delayed emergence

When turtles spend the winter in the nest after they hatch, opposed to leaving in the fall

Freeze resistant

When an animal can keep their body fluids frozen in liquid state even below the freezing point

Supercool

• A supercooled liquid is a liquid that remains unfrozen below its freezing point (possible when there is nothing in the liquid that allows ice crystals to form)

• A supercooled liquid is very unstable, so whenever there is an opportunity for an ice crystal to form, the entire liquid can freeze in a split second

Deciduous

Plants that lose their leaves every year

Evergreens

Plants that retain their leaves for more than one year or don’t lose them on an annual basis

Stomata

• pores in leaves that open for CO2

Cuticles

The thick waxy coating of conifer needles (also on deciduous leaves but thinner)

Phloem

A pipe that moves sugars from photosynthesis from the leaves to the rest of the plant

Xylem

Pipes that move water from the roots to the rest of the plant

Trachieds

Individual ‘straws’ in xylem

Embolism

When an air bubble forms in a trachea

Autotrophs

• Organisms that make their own food

• Most Plants, bacteria, algae,

Heterotrophs

• Organisms that need to feed on other organisms (alive or dead)

• All animals (some plants)

Positive phototropism

Tendency to grow towards the light

Negative phototropism

Tendency to grow away from the light

Understory plant

Plants that grow in the layer of a forest beneath the main tree canopy but above the forest floor

Photosynthetically active radiation (PAR)

• the range of radiation for which photosynthesis is possible (basically visible spectrum)

• Good light zones of PAR are from 400-500nm (chlorophyll b) and 600-700nm (chlorophyll a)

Tendrils

Vines that latch onto other objects/plants to grow

Adventitious roots

Special roots that poison ivy produces to latch onto trees or other surfaces and grow on them

Chlorophyll a

Converts light energy into chemical energy

Chlorophyll b

Capture light and sends it to chlorophyll a

Spring ephemerals

• Plants that specialize in exploiting the very short window of time in the spring where trees have not yet grown

• These plants concentrate all their photosynthesis during that short period of time, then become dormant for the rest of the season

Bulb/corm

Underground structure that the plant is storing all its energy/carbohydrates into

Peatland

• A type of wetland

• By peat moss/sphagnum moss

Utricle

• a specialized structure that captures underwater prey

• Has a ‘trap door’ that opens really quickly and sucks inside the invertebrate

• It opening is triggered by trigger hairs

• It creates the vacuum inside by pumping water outside its structure

Fungi

• more closely related to animals than they are to plants

• They feed by secreting digestive enzymes onto whatever they are feeding on and breaking it down and absorbing those digestive products into their bodies

• Not always mushroom shaped

• Body of a mushroom is underground

Hyphae

• a single filament in a mycelium