Population Ecology Lab Report
Population Ecology: Clover Distribution and Density
Method
This lab consisted of the use of various materials. We used four orange flags in order to mark a 30x15m sampling area in which we collected our data from. To measure out the area, we used a thirty meter measuring tape and to determine the density (plants per meter squared) of clovers in the lawn, we calculated the total area of the plot (30x15meters squared). For this lab, a frisbee was used with the area of .053 meters squared as the quadrat. We used a frisbee for a couple reasons. A frisbee was easy to throw and easy to count how many clovers were in the sample area. Our group decided on taking 15 samples throughout the 30x15m sampling area in order to collect a more accurate average. The frisbee was randomly thrown and wherever it landed was where the data was taken. …show more content…
This was determined through observation of the samplings collected. Figure 1 demonstrates a frequency histogram in which the data represents the frequency intervals and the amount of samples that fall into each interval. The zero to five interval contained a total of seven samples as well as the six to ten interval. The eleven to fifteen interval had only one sample within it.
The clumped distribution was evident because clovers cannot spread their seeds very far, so the population did not advance out. As figure 2 presents, the density increased as the sample size increased. This representation of data can also be seen in the table next to the figure as it shows how the sample size affects the mean and standard deviation of the clovers. Both the mean and standard deviation increased as the sample size increased (Table 1). This is because the greater the sample size, the greater the samples which, in turn, gave cause for the increase in mean and standard deviation.
Method
This lab consisted of the use of various materials. We used four orange flags in order to mark a 30x15m sampling area in which we collected our data from. To measure out the area, we used a thirty meter measuring tape and to determine the density (plants per meter squared) of clovers in the lawn, we calculated the total area of the plot (30x15meters squared). For this lab, a frisbee was used with the area of .053 meters squared as the quadrat. We used a frisbee for a couple reasons. A frisbee was easy to throw and easy to count how many clovers were in the sample area. Our group decided on taking 15 samples throughout the 30x15m sampling area in order to collect a more accurate average. The frisbee was randomly thrown and wherever it landed was where the data was taken. …show more content…
This was determined through observation of the samplings collected. Figure 1 demonstrates a frequency histogram in which the data represents the frequency intervals and the amount of samples that fall into each interval. The zero to five interval contained a total of seven samples as well as the six to ten interval. The eleven to fifteen interval had only one sample within it.
The clumped distribution was evident because clovers cannot spread their seeds very far, so the population did not advance out. As figure 2 presents, the density increased as the sample size increased. This representation of data can also be seen in the table next to the figure as it shows how the sample size affects the mean and standard deviation of the clovers. Both the mean and standard deviation increased as the sample size increased (Table 1). This is because the greater the sample size, the greater the samples which, in turn, gave cause for the increase in mean and standard deviation.