Environmental Biology Exam 2

What natural disaster data/ energy data is reliable for climate change evidence

• Cyclone energy 

  • How messy data is and how it can not be used correctly 

    • Statistically, the data are suspicious and there is no concrete proof that cyclones are getting stronger with climate change

    • The data is very messy and hard to interpret 

• Flooding, on the other hand, has a much better signal 

  • Some data is good on some weather events, and not strong on other events

• Weather events actually have high attribution to climate change 

  • Extreme heat, extreme cold

  • Droughts 

  • Extreme rainfall 

  • Extreme snow and ice 

  • Less significant 

    • Tropical cyclones, wildfires, extra-tropical cyclones, severe convective storms 

Climate models and implications

• Huge amounts of assumptions 

  • Different models have different assumptions 

  • A good climate model aggregates all of these models together 

• Some projections have different severities 

• All models though show a continual increase with no modification

Climate change denial 

• Confirmation bias 

  • Seek out data that supports your hypothesis, rather than data that may actually show climate change 

Projections with Climate Mitigation 

• Depends on what we do, what we commit to, the model can change 

• If we do mitigation, we can stop things

• Climate models have not always been correct 

  • They are just statistical observations

Arctic sea ice melt perpetuation of climate change

• Arctic sea ice melt 

  • Raises sea level

  • Changes in the thermohaline convoy 

  • It has changed 

    • There is no longer heavy melting. There is some stabilization sea ice melting. 

  • Arctic sea ice melt contributes to climate change by raising sea levels and impacting the thermohaline circulation. While heavy melting has decreased, some stabilization has been observed, but the overall trend remains concerning.

Conservation: species-focused approaches

• Red List 

• Extent of occurrence and area of occupancy 

• Can we save a species just by restoring its current habitat? 

• How might climate change affect it? 

• What about climate change? 

Restoring a species' current habitat is a vital foundation for conservation, but it is rarely enough on its own to save a species from extinction. While fixing local damage—such as removing invasive plants or rebuilding degraded wetlands—helps stabilize population numbers, many species face multiple overlapping pressures like pollution, overhunting, disease, and genetic bottlenecks that habitat repair alone cannot fix. [1, 2, 3]

Climate change intensifies these challenges by rapidly shifting temperatures, altering rainfall patterns, and causing extreme weather events like severe droughts and wildfires. As the climate warms, historical habitats may become too hot, dry, or otherwise unsuitable, forcing species to migrate toward new areas. However, fragmented landscapes often block their movement, and ecosystems can transform faster than species can adapt or evolve. Saving species now requires "restoring forwards"—designing flexible, resilient landscapes, connecting wildlife corridors, and actively managing climate stress alongside traditional habitat recovery. [1, 2, 3, 4]

• It will get hotter for plants. How do plants move? 

• They must move to different areas that mimic their old climate due to climate change

Some species may shift their range northward or upward in altitude to find suitable temperatures and moisture. However, many are limited by habitat fragmentation and human developments.

Species Distribution Modeling

• 1. Figure out current climate

• 2. Find this same climate and where it will be located in the future 

• 3. This is where the species will most likely end up 

• We look at environmental layers (where it lives, what is that environment like? Temp? Food? biome?) and physiological requirements, then project it on a model based on how climate or the environment in general will change. You can also go backwards in time to see how the species existed in different climates

Tropical savanna example of SDM

• Cerrado flora and climate change 

  • Estimated geographical range shifts of thousands of angiosperms 

  • The tropical savanna, particularly the Cerrado region in Brazil, illustrates the application of Species Distribution Modeling (SDM) by predicting shifts in flora due to climate change. Estimates suggest that thousands of angiosperm species will experience significant geographical range changes as temperatures and precipitation patterns evolve.

What is SSP?

• Shared socioeconomic pathway 

• Predictions of how we are going to react as a society with climate change 

• SSP1 is the most optimistic pathway

Examining shifts in SSP

• The mountainous areas on an SSP graph have high species richness because more species will start living on mountains due to climate change 

• Some legumes will gain range with climate change 

  • This is because they are finding more areas suitable for their thriving 

• One partridge pea lives only in the mountains in Brazil 

  • They are already on the tops of the mountains, so there is nowhere to go when the climate warms up, so they will probably go extinct 

• Plants will have to move from five to seven meters upslope per decade to track climate change 

  • This matches the current literature 

  • It isn’t that bad

Restoration with SSP

• Restoration

  • These models may not be realistic 

    • SSP 1 or 5 are too extreme

    • Farmlands and pasture which are going to increase in magnitude, are not gonna allow plants to migrate 

• It is not all climate 

  • It also depends on biome distribution 

  • Fire, soil, are also key controls besides temperature and human movement

Microclimates

• A microclimate is a small, localized area where the climate conditions—like temperature, wind, and humidity—differ from the surrounding regional weather.

  • Mobile animals constantly shift between microhabitats—basking in warm sunlit spots or retreating to cool shade—to manage body temperature

  • Forest canopies and complex topography can reduce the effective rate of warming, cutting local thermal shifts.

• The north and south side of a mountain can be radically different 

• Microclimates and landuse changes are hard to model so this is another shortcoming of these models

Many people have historically had different opinions on what a species is 

• Many use the biological species concept 

  • A species is a reproductive community of populations that occupies a specific niche in nature

  • There are many definitions of species 

Many species definitions

• Reproductive isolation 

  • Most used key to speciation 

  • The largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce offspring …

• Species definition 2 

  • A class of individuals having common attributes and designated by a common name

• Definition 3

  • A single lineage of ancestor-descendant populations of organisms which maintains its identity through space and time and shares evolutionary trajectory

• Isolating mechanisms 

  • Species must evolve these if they behave as biological species 

  • Related species may flower at different times, so they cannot exchange pollen 

• Prezygotic (before mating mechanisms) 

  • Separation of flowering time (phenological separation)

  • Different pollination strategies (e.g. bee vs beetle)

  • Pollen compatibility (can male pollen reach the female ovule)

• Postzygotic mechanisms (after mating) 

  • Hybrid fitness/sterility 

Why do species definitions matter?

• Various species have been rendered extinct as a consequence of economic growth and development 

• Other species have been extremely depleted in numbers 

• Animals are of extreme value in many ways 

  • The challenge is: what is a species? This is a practical concern.

Is the Red Wolf a species? Also Dire Wolf example

• Critically endangered 

• One native population in North Carolina 

  • Systematically shot and removed 

• Breeding population 

• Red-wolf like animals in texas and hybridization with coyotes 

• The red wolf do have enough genetic variability to be its own separate species 

• Dire Wolf 

  • An extinct wolf that was a large and fierce wild wolf 

  • They were able to regenerate some DNA to get Dire wolf babies

species vs subspecies

• Difference between species and subspecies

  • A species is a distinct group of organisms that cannot successfully breed with other groups

  • A  subspecies is a distinct population within that same species that can still interbreed but usually does not due to geographic separation

Reanalyzing existing species caused a change of recognized species from 1245→1912 species

Should we guard against a political species concept

• Yes. Mace said we need to recognize as many species as possible. 

• No. Gentry said that we should look for and present genetic evidence. 

  • Taxonomic science is incredibly dynamic

Why defining species is hard

• Clonal reproduction 

  • a form of asexual reproduction where an organism makes a genetic copy of itself without mixing DNA with another organism

  • Parthogenesis 

• Hybridization 

• Polyploidy 

Polyploidy

• Polyploidy causes instant speciation by creating an immediate reproductive barrier between an organism with extra chromosome sets and its parent species.

• A new polyploid organism cannot successfully breed with the original diploid parents. Breeding a 4n (tetraploid) with a 2n (diploid) usually yields sterile 3n (triploid) offspring.

Hybridization

• Interbreeding between related species

•  A lot of mixing of genomes of tropical Inga plants 

  • Chemical defense genes seem to be preferentially retained after hybridization 

    • Certain genes in general seem to be kept in the genome of hybrids 

  • Escape from insect herbivores is the ecological opportunity 

    • A lot of caterpillars eat Inga trees. So they have to have good protection regardless, cause they give a good advantage 

• Hybridization has left its imprints on us too

  • 1-4% of the modern human genome has a Neanderthal origin 

  • That includes some immunity genes that were likely beneficial to Homo sapiens

Real examples of polyploidy

• Foods we eat 

  • Tragopogon plant 

    • Three species that start out 

    • They each have 12 chromosomes 

    • In the course of the hybridization between these species, it can cause doubling of species 

• Goldfish 

  • Two species that hybridize

    • Results in diploid, triploid, and tetraploid species 

      • Parthenogenesis – virgin birth is how they reproduce 

Cryptic species

• Cryptic species are two or more distinct, genetically isolated species that look almost identical and cannot be easily told apart by their physical appearance

• There have been many surprises, even in large mammals

  • two African elephant species (Gilbert 2010; Rohland et al. 2010; Groves 2016) and two Ponderosa pine tree species in northwestern North America (Latta and Mitton 1999; Willyard et al. 2017) exemplify the many cases of overlooked, large-bodied species”.

  • New penguin species, first described in a century, this month!

Distribution curve 

• How far do animals move up and down their home range 

• Plants can move slowly through generations 

  • However, if, over generations, some have adaptations that help them do well in a different environment, they can move through it. 

• A distribution curve shows the range of variation in a particular trait or behavior across a population, illustrating how many individuals exist at different levels of that trait. In ecology, it often depicts how species distribute themselves spatially and temporally in response to environmental factors.

Ecological niche

• A species’ environment and its role in that environment 

• Warblers and spruce trees 

  • Many different warbler species live on the same tree 

  • Their body morphology and beak size are all very, very similar, but each bird took an ecological zone of the tree and divided it up among themselves, where some lived in the top, some in the middle, etc. 

Fundamental niche

• All the possible conditions under which the species can survive and persist 

Realized niche 

• The conditions where the species actually occurs 

Optimum range

• The range in which most organisms actually survive under varying environmental conditions, such as salinity or temperature. 

With climate change, how will the optimal range change?

As climate change progresses, the optimal range for many species may shift, altering their survival capacity due to changing environmental conditions such as temperature and precipitation patterns.

Why does a species not occupy its entire niche? 

• Cannot compete with other species for food, living space 

• Food, microhabitat, and symbiotic species are not present 

• Predator or pathogens

• The species has not migrated to its entire range 

• Humans have extirpated species 

Biological interactions and how it effects the realized niche

Biological interactions, such as competition, predation, and symbiosis, significantly influence an organism's realized niche by limiting or enhancing its access to resources and space. These interactions shape the actual living conditions a species can occupy, often preventing it from utilizing its entire fundamental niche.

Panda case study

These organisms have been extirpated from lowlands and now are restricted to mountainous regions. Demonstrates niche contraction due to habitat loss and human activities.

Beavers case study

• More limited current distribution, but expanding again 

• Declined because of European fur, was limited bc of human activity 

  • Castor canadensis, Castor fiber

    • All around the USA 

      • Is a habitat GENERALIST and highly adaptable

      • Can live in many different habitats

  • Beaver 

    • A choosy Generalist 

      • Eat plants and forbs, grasses, grains and row groups in the spring and summer 

      • fall/winter: tubers, bark, and cambium 

    • They create important dams, which provide cover from predators

    • Ecosystem engineers 

      • World’s largest beaver dam 

      • Found in Alberta 

      • 850m

Beavers criticality and generalist example

Beavers, as habitat generalists, adapt to diverse environments and play a critical role in ecosystems by creating dams. These structures enhance biodiversity and provide necessary habitats for various species.

Koala bear and dietary specialist

Koalas are herbivorous marsupials that primarily feed on eucalyptus leaves, making them specialized diet-dependent mammals. Their reliance on specific tree species limits their distribution and adaptability.

Specialism

• Very good at one thing, but not good at anything else 

• Usually very good at things OTHER species CANNOT do 

invasive species case study

• Cane toad 

  • Change from occupying a realized nice to a fundamental niche 

  • When an invasive species is released from its pathogen or any other predators, it can spread wildly in a novel environment 

  • has no biological control anymore

  • Introduced to control cane beetles 

• The cane toad's native range is in South America 

  • In its native range in South America it is a competitor of the Cane Toad, so that population is controlled

How will climate change affect a species' range? 

Climate change can lead to shifting habitats and altered environmental conditions, forcing species to migrate to more suitable areas for survival. This may result in changes to their distribution and potential challenges in finding resources.

Using SDM This allows managers or ecology professionals to begin to get an idea of where species will go to make management decisions for conservation and restoration 

Aleutian Islands example

(shows trophic cascade, interconectedness of the environment)

Direct correlation between the amount of kelp, the amount of sea urchins, and ecosystem health

orca whales example and how it caused the trophic cascade

• Orcas began hunting more sea otters after 1990, which affected the population significantly again 

  • They also affected the sea lions. The population declined in the Aleutian Islands 

  • This was caused by a trophic cascade

  • WHY?

• Trophic cascade Aleutian Islands 

  • 1. 1977, Water 2 degrees warmer 

  • 2. Plankton population declines 

  • 3. Copepods and Krill (plankton predators) declines 

  • 4. Shrimp, crab, fish (copepods and krill predators) declines

  • 5. High fat fish replaced by cod and pollock 

  • 6. Sea lions and harbor seals no longer able to eat their preferred diet, so they decline as well 

    • For the sea lions, this fish is not as nutritious, so they become thinner 

  • 7. So sea lions get thinner, and then orcas diet shifts to otters because sea lions are not fat enough. Otters are not big, so orcas eat a lot which hurts the species population 

  • 8. Sea urchins increased because otters are gone 

  • 9. Kelp declined

Food chain vs food web

• A food chain is a linear sequence of organisms showing how energy and nutrients move from one living thing to another, while a food web is a complex, interconnected network of multiple overlapping food chains within an ecosystem

Demography

• Understand the size, movement and structure of population

• Examples 

  • Prairie dogs 

    • Unchecked population growth leads to damage in the ecosystem 

Thomas Malthus idea demography

• Population, when unchecked, increases in a geometric ratio 

• The number of people usually increases faster than resources can support that population 

Charles Darwin idea demography

• Alot of individuals in a population which results in competition 

• “Struggle for existence”, not enough food 

Paul Ehrlich idea demography

• The Population Bomb 

• The authors warned that the Earth could not sustain growing human numbers and urged immediate government and global action to slow or stop population growth (1968).

• We are reproducing so fast that it will cause mass starvation. He was wrong because there was a huge technological improvement in agriculture

  • Based on faulty or racist views 

Components of Population Growth

• Fertility: natural capability to produce offspring 

• Mortality: susceptible to death 

• Migration: movement of individuals into and out of an area 

How fast a population is growing equation 

• Population change = (Births + Immigration) – (Deaths + Emigration)

Exponential growth

• Unchecked, no limit

• Malthus, Ehrlich, and Darwin thought of this model. 

• Not realistic 

Logistic growth – what is more realistic

• Logistic growth describes population increase that is limited by resource availability, leading to a stabilizing population size at the carrying capacity of the environment. This model accounts for factors such as competition, predation, and environmental constraints.

Carrying capacity

• Carrying capacity (K)

  • The maximum population size of a biological species that a specific environment can sustainably support over time, given the available food, water, habitat, and other resources

Examples of exponential growth (artificial) 

• When growing bacteria in a flask, you can see that they grow exponentially 

• All bacteria and all species have different growth rates. This is called the growth rate, R_0. 

• We always have moments of exponential growth, but then it stops, because we can never have a population go to infinity 

• Many creatures, like the harbor seals, will oscillate around the carrying capacity of the environment 

Population crashes

• Populations can overshoot the carrying capacity and result in environmental damage 

• Reindeers 

  • Introduced onto Aluetian islands 

  • Exponential growth 

  • Population crash 

  • Exceeded carrying capacity 

  • Severe environmental damage 

Density-dependent regulation

• an ecological process where a population's growth rate is controlled by its own density, acting as a negative feedback loop that stabilizes population size. As a population becomes more crowded, these factors lower birth rates, increase death rates, or drive migration to keep the population near its carrying capacity (the maximum number of individuals an environment can support)

• Resource competition, predation, disease, waste accumulation, aggression 

Density-dependent survivorship

• Negative density dependence: Survival rates decrease as population density increases. This happens because more individuals means harsher competition for limited food, water, and space, as well as faster spread of diseases and higher risks from predators

• Positive density dependence (Allee effect): Survival or growth rates increase at higher densities (up to a point) and drop when the population becomes too sparse. This can happen if a minimum group size is needed for defense, cooperative hunting, or finding mates.

survivorship curve

A graphical representation of the number of individuals surviving at each age for a given species. It depicts the various patterns of mortality and survival rates across different age groups, illustrating life history strategies.

Type 1

• High survival probability during early and middle life, with a rapid increase in death rates (old age) later in life (convex shape).

• Usually K-selected—species produce very few offspring and invest heavily in parental care.

• Humans, elephants, and large mammals.

Type 2

• A roughly constant mortality rate throughout the entire lifespan; the chance of dying is unrelated to age (diagonal line).

• Intermediate investment between Type I and Type III.

• Many species of birds, rodents, and some lizards

Type 3

• Very high death rates (low survival) early in life (during the juvenile/larval stage), but those who reach maturity experience a low death rate and live a long time (concave shape).

• Usually r-selected—species produce massive numbers of offspring at once with little to no parental care.

• Oysters, fish, insects, and most marine invertebrates.

How important is density dependence in nature?

• Blue Spot Butterfly 

  • Larvae by the butterfly is picked up by the ant, where the ant brings food to the pupae and feed it even to the detriment to its own offspring 

  • Releases pheromones that mimics those of the ant larvae

    • (brood) parasitic behavior 

      • Is reproduction density-dependent?

• Survivorship is actually dependent on butterfly density 

• More larvae in a particular area, the lower is the growth of that population 

Are survivorship curves adaptive

• Species in stable and predictive environments often have Type 1 survivorship curves with relatively low rates of reproduction 

  • Evolution knows the offspring they reproduce will be successful due to the stable environment

Primary succession

•  Primary succession is the gradual and slow process of ecological colonization that begins on completely barren, lifeless substrates lacking soil—such as newly cooled lava flows, retreating glaciers, or exposed bare rock. The process starts when hardy pioneer species (like lichens, mosses, and algae) arrive and begin breaking down the rock surfaces into a basic layer of organic soil. As these early organisms grow, die, and decompose, they enrich the young soil, allowing simple grasses, herbs, and eventually shrubs and trees to take root. Over hundreds to thousands of years, this sequence leads to a stable and mature ecosystem known as a climax community.

• Pioneer species are generally type 3 

Secondary succession

• Secondary succession is the ecological process where a previously established plant and animal community re-establishes itself after a disturbance that clears or damages the vegetation but leaves the soil, nutrients, and some organic seeds or roots intact.

• A lot of type 3 species — in St. Louis a lot of empty lots allowed this to happen

North STL secondary succession

• North St. Louis has a lot of vacant land 

  • What are the environmental opportunities? 

  • How should they interact with the neighborhoods?

    • Urban forestry 

    • Subsistence farming (shared)

Predator-prey system

• Traits of predator species 

  • Usually are K selected (near carrying capacity

  • A lot of offspring care and intelligence

• Traits of prey species 

  • Rapid reproduction 

  • Morphology 

  • Usually are selected for reproduction (r)

Effects of predation example big horn sheep

• Big horn sheep 

  • Adaptation by life history changes 

  • Hunting selects for individuals with large horns 

    • When animals were hunted, they were prized for their horns 

    • So animals began getting smaller and shorter horns through generations 

    • When hunting was banned, you got an increase again in horn length 

    • It also turned out horn hooves began to grow out slower and slower 

hunting example predation

• Cod was heavily fished in the North Atlantic 

• Under heavy human predation 

  • Fish began growing much much slowly 

  • Fish began reproducing at lower age 

• Hunting changes demographics and morphology

Phlox life history adaptation and survivorship

• Flowering plant 

• Phlox drumondii: Deep red plant (winter annual) 

  • Seeds germinate in one season, and then REPRODUCES and DIES 

• Annual habit is an adaptation 

  • Grow and reproduce fast before you are eaten 

    • Gophers continuously disrupt the soil and eat the plants 

    • Seed harvester ants 

      • Herbivory 

      • Also eat the phlox 

• These plants produce a complex survivorship curve 

  • 
    

    • Seeds have an equal chance of surviving at any time in the soil (whether or not they encounter an ant), then they live for a very long time after germination until they die at old age 

• These survivorship curves function to respond to other environmental stresses

• Summary 

  • Annual 

    • The phlox is an annual because it is adapted to a disturbed habitat 

    • Short growin season 

    • Rapid growth 

  • Seeds in soil 

    • Avoids heat of summer 

  • Germination in winter

    • Allows winter growth 

    • Removes individual from high mortality life stage

Human population growth estimate

• Currently 8.3 billion people 

• 7 billion by 2012 

  • Human population is growing 

  • Changing quickly 

tech and human population growth

• Technological advancements has raised the carrying capacity of the Earth for humans 

• Human population projections 

  • We will ultimately hit our carrying capacity regardless of technological advancements 

    • Projected to go up to 10.5 billion in 2100

    • Growth is very rapid 

      • Then slows down 

Population projections

• Similar to climate models 

  • Different assumptions and estimates 

    • High is 15 billion 

    • Low is 7.5 billion

  • Different areas of the world have different growth rates 

Human distribution

• Shift in an economic viability in a country when a lot of people move to cities 

• More than half the world lives in just 7 countries. India, China, USA, Indonesia, Pakistan, Nigeria, and Brazil. 

  • Africa has the highest growth rate 

Fertility rates

• Vary with many factors 

• Fertility rate = # of live birth / 1000 women of childbearing age 

What determines whether someone has a baby?

• Economic factors (will I be able to raise my child?)

• During 1920s-1930s there was a serious economic issue which led to a huge decline in birth rate 

• Fertility rates are decreasing in many human population 

  • Highly developed countries tend to have less children (More expensive perhaps?)

  • Before about 1950, Americans had large families. This is because it was a largely agricultural society. Economic advantage of having a lot of children because they needed people to work for the farm. 

Death rates over time

• Death rates have changed because of modern medicine 

• Sanitation increased, public health departments in each state 

• Penicillin

  • Covid increased 

• Males and females have different death rates 

  • Males engage in more hazardous activities 

  • Males under more stress?

Excess deaths

• The difference between the observed numbers of deaths in specific time period and expected numbers of deaths in the same time periods.

Expected deaths

• The average and usual variation of deaths in a “normal” time period

Excess deaths due to hurricanes

• Deaths happened for many years after the hurricanes 

  • Healthcare shut down after hurricanes which burdened the community

Human life expectancy

• statistical measure of the estimate of the average remaining years of life at a given age

• Life Expectancies Vary Greatly in the US Due to:

  • Economic factors

  • Environment

    • For example, high pollution and high asthma burden 

  • Social Factors

  • State Policies

  • Public Health Programs

  • Weather

• Life expectancy in the US by place of birth 

  • People that are foreign born and immigrate to the USA have a higher life expectancy compared to people born in the USA 

• Race and ethnicity land life expectancy 

  • African Americans have the lowest life expectancies in the USA 

  • Hispanics have the highest life expectancies in the USA 

• Large variation in different genders life expectancy 

  • In 2000 compared to 1900 longest life spans have increased dramatically but shortest life spans have not changed that much 

field stations

• Center for environmental research, teaching, and public engagement around the world 

Sevilleta field station

• 1993 hantavirus outbreak 

  • 1989: New field starting counting music to study the ecosystem

  • 1993: New virus carried by deer mice kills healthy young adults

    • More mice means more chance to interact with people 

  • 1998: El Nino returns, mice book again, and CDC warns public in advamce 

Field research infrastructure at Tyson

• Caves, oak-hickory forest, prescribed fire, exclosures, research garden, field experiments, etc

• Long term monitoring at Tyson 

  • Vernal pool phenology

  • Bat monitoring 

  • Global forest observatory 

  • Planetary inventory of life 

  • Tree seed forecasting 

  • Insect abundance 

  • Plant population ecology 

  • Urban wildlife 

Why monitor long term and why field stations? 

• Capture slow change, rare events, protected lands, expert staff 

Forest biodiversity at Tyson 

• 20 hectares 

• 1981 

  • First 4 ha plot 

• 39,000 stems of 42 woody species 

• One plot in a global network 

• Pawpaw example 

  • Inside pawpaw patches, plots had fewer plants and species, and more random species mixes

• Jonathan Myers 

  • What drives latitudinal biodiversity gradient? 

    • Pattern where there are more species toward the equator that declines toward the pole 

Urban Wildlife Information Network

• Heat magnifies urban effect on diversity 

  • Animals can go from diurnal species to nocturnal based on heat 

  • Also noisy cities can hamper animal communication

Bats at Tyson

• Which bats live at Tyson and how do we study them? 

  • 14 bat species in Missouri 

  • 11 bat species at Tyson 

    • Track seasonal cave use over time 

    • Monitor bat diversity and activity away from caves 

    • Restore bat habitat and measure how bats respond 

• Listening for bats: two recorders 

  • NAbat 

    • Records when it detects a bat call 

  • AudioMoth 

    • Records at set intervals 

• Mincke Quarry cave 

  • Gray and big brown bats 

• Twin ponds 

  • Indiana, northern, big brown, bats 

Ticks

• Why would people want to study ticks? 

  • One Health 

    • Ticks link people, animals, and the environment 

• Tick-borne viruses 

  • Heartland virus 

    • Causes phlebovirus 

  • Bourbon virus 

    • Both from lone start ticks 

• Tyson researcher collected ticks at 8 sites and they found adult males to have the most amount of heartland and bourbon viruses 

  • A lot of animals in Tyson had antibodies to the viruses but in Wildcare park animals did not have antibodies to the ticks 

• Purpose of ticks and mosquitoes 

• Food source

• Pathogens that they spread control populations 

• What happens to a day-biting mosquito in a city that never gets fully dark, and keeps getting hotter? 

• 2C warmer in the city vs in rural areas 

• Night sky is brightening about 10% each year 

• Three questions from the mosquito lab 

  • Mosquitos use light as their clock 

    • It bites by day 

    • Body temperature tacks the air so heat waves hit hard 

    • An invasive day-biter can carry dengue, chikungunya and Zika 

    • Urban and suburban habitat support about 10 times larger pops than rural habitat 

  • Do city lights delay the winter shutdown? 

  • Do bright, hot nights push the biting into the night?

  • Can mosquitos ride out heat waves?

• 40% less diapause when mosquitoes were raised under simulated light at night in a common-garden experiment 

• Lauren Johnson work 

  • In light-pollution, mosquitoes bite more at night but only when it is really hot during the day 

• Kathleen Dobbs 

  • Does a heat wave affect a mosquito differently at different life stages? 

    • Adult survival dropped significantly 

    • Fewer eggs hatches, females developed faster, and fewer pupae and adults survived 

Huge difference in how long people in STL live to in just geographic location in the city 

differnet regions have different live expectancies

• Adaptation to the environment 

• There are physical limits set by the climate for growth and development 

• There are ways to understand how species can adapt to this and move around their environment 

• There are biological limits set by biological communities like Niches and competition 

• Demography helps us understand how reproduction and survivorship can be shaped by the environment and is adaptive 

Evolution

Evolution is biological change over time, defined as descent with modification, where lineages of organisms change across generations as they inherit genetic traits from a common ancestor.

Adaptation to the environment

Horse and Equis adaptation

• Mesohippus (the start) lived in forests and foot had spread toes to deal with uneven grounds and the diet was mainly foliage with short appendages because it was getting stuff from the forest floor 

• Climate change happened which led to the creation of grasslands, which caused the slow evolution towards the modern day horse which is larger, grassland focused, and has a single toe, because of grasslands. Also has adapted teeth for grasses, and a mobile upper lip for grabbing grasses. 

Key innovations

• a novel physical, physiological, or behavioral trait that allows a group of organisms to exploit new ecological niches and rapidly diversify

• For example: water to land 

  • How did animals adapt to land? What animal was first to walk on land? 

  • We can understand this through paleontology

Tiktaalik organism

Over millions of years, the ancestors of Tiktaalik gradually accumulated adaptations as they moved from deep waters into shallow, muddy environments, shifting from purely aquatic creatures into animals capable of navigating land. This transition began with ancient lobe-finned fish developing robust internal fin bones that slowly evolved into a recognizable "one bone, two bones, wrist bones" pattern, giving them the strength to prop up their bodies and push against riverbeds. As these organisms spent more time in shallow water, their skulls flattened, their eyes moved to the top of their heads to see above the surface, and they lost the bones connecting their head to their shoulders, creating a mobile neck to look around without moving their whole body. Over generations, their ribs became stronger to prevent their bodies from collapsing under gravity outside of water, their gills were supplemented by primitive lungs for breathing air, and their hind fins evolved into heavy pelvic structures, eventually allowing their tetrapod descendants to leave the water entirely and walk on land.

Homologous structures

• physical features or anatomical traits in different species that share a common evolutionary origin and ancestry, even if they now serve different functions

  • Forelimbs are homologous, evolution modifies previous structures 

Evolutionary constraints

• internal or external factors that restrict, channel, or block certain phenotypic variations and evolutionary pathways

• Previous structures can constrain how new structures function or evolve

  • Our body still has remnants of when we were fish-like organisms

Vestigiality

the presence of body parts or organs that have lost their original function through evolution, serving as remnants of ancestral forms.

Recurrent laryngeal nerve case example vestigial

is an example of a vestigial structure in mammals; it traverses a longer pathway than necessary, reflecting evolutionary history.