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Photo 1
Photo 1: A picture of the Dowling Catholic tallgrass prairie which is 648 meters squared
that we used to conduct our experiment.
Photo 2
Photo 2: This is a picture of Dowlings lowland forest which is 24726.29 meters squared
and was used to conduct this experiment.
Figure 1
Figure 1: This graph compares the biomass of the Dowling Catholic prairie and woods
biomass in grams per meter squared. The biomass is of the prairie is greater than the
woods according to our research. The P-value shows a strong correlation in the woods
and prairie biomass.
Figure 2
Figure 2: This graph compares the average richness of the plants in the woods and
prairie on campus. The woods has a higher plant biodiversity according to this graph.
This P-value shows a strong correlation between the data.
Figure 3
Figure 3: This graph compares the average evenness (Shannon Index) of the plants in
the prairie and the woods. The woods has a much higher amount of plant biodiversity
evenness compared to the prairie. The P-value shows a not very strong significance.
Figure 4
Figure 4: This graph compares the insect biodiversity richness in the woods and the
prairie. The woods has a greater insect richness than the prairie according to our
research. The P-value was shows a lack of significance.
Figure 5
Figure 5: This graph compares the average insect evenness (Shannon Index) in the
woods and the prairie. The evenness of the woods is higher compared to that of the
prairie. The P-value shows a low amount of scientific significance.
Figure 6
Figure 6: This graph compared the biomass of the woods and prairie to the biodiversity
richness of woods and prairie. The R value was .702. The P-value shows a strong
amount of significance.
Discussion
All of our graphs are made up of data that we collected and we analyzed in order
to support our hypothesis. P-values were collected for our graphs in order to show the
significance of our data. Each graph is a different aspect of our data from our
experiments.
Figure 1 shows the biomass of the woods and prairie on the Dowling campus in
grams per meter squared. This shows the effectiveness of the forest and prairie. It also
compares which ecosystem is more beneficial in means of biomass to the environment.
The p-value found shows a strong amount of significance in our data.The graph helps
implicate the biological matter of our ecosystems, we can therefore relate that to the
richness and evenness of each ecosystem. Biomass overall will increase if richness
increases2. The biomass in the prairie is greater and we should then increase size of
the prairie to increase the biomass to make it more beneficial.
Figure 2 shows the plant richness compared between the woods and the prairie
on campus. The richness shows the different amount of species and the richness of the
woods was significantly more than that of the prairie. The P-value found shows a strong
amount of significance between the data. If we expand the prairie then it will be capable
to support more variety of species and hopefully will exceed that of the woods. Plant
diversity is essential to producing biomass3. If we increase the plant richness, that will
then increase plant biodiversity therefore increasing plant biomass overall.
Figure 3 shows the average biodiversity evenness of the plants of the woods and
the prairie. Evenness measures the relative abundance of the different species that
make up the richness of different areas. The evenness was needed in order to compare
with figure 2, that shows the richness of the plants in the woods and the prairie. The
woods has a greater evenness compared to the prairie. Biodiversity conservation is
important to to maintain an ecosystem 10. If we make the prairie bigger, it can gain a
greater amount of evenness which will cause it to function better and it will be more
beneficial compared to now. In order to keep this current amount of evenness, we need
to conserve our prairie.
Figure 4 shows the insect biodiversity richness of the woods and prairie. The
richness is the amount of species in the sample that we collected. This is important
because the insect richness will rely on the plant biomass. If there is a low amount of
plant biomass than there will be a low amount of insect richness. Many species are
needed to maintain multiple functions at many times and many different ecosystems 9.
We need to maintain a healthy amount of plant biodiversity in order to maintain insect
richness. Plant diversity is essential to producing biomass 3. This is important to know
because we need a high amount of richness to provide many different services to the
ecosystem and therefore make a variety of species of insects essential for our
ecosystem to that they can remain functioning. We also need to have a large amount of
plant diversity in our ecosystem, shown in figure 1, so that we can produce a larger
amount of biomass. Richness in the woods is greater than that of the prairie so we
should expand the prairie to increase the richness and exceed that of the woods.
Figure 5 shows the insect biodiversity evenness of the woods and prairie on the
Dowling campus. The insect evenness is greater in the prairie, showing that the
biodiversity in the prairie is greater than the woods. This graph relates to figure 4
because it is important to know the biodiversity evenness and richness of an ecosystem
in order to determine how it is functioning. Biodiversity helps maintain community and
ecosystem processes9. With a greater insect biodiversity evenness, we can maintain a
stable ecosystem and have a well functioning forest and prairie. It would be more
beneficial to increase the prairie because it is already strong in insect biodiversity which
would support plant biomass and it would increase even more if we expanded it.
In Figure 6 we are comparing the plant biomass and plant biodiversity and seeing
the correlation between them. We need to see how they impact each other and how the
different amounts of one impacts the others. Plant biomass helps increase plant
biodiversity. Figure 1 helped us compare the biomass of the woods and the prairie, but
this graph compares plant biomass specifically. A change in plant biodiversity will
cause a huge increase in productivity in an ecosystem 4. If we increase our prairie
biomass, it will increase our biodiversity. Biodiversity helps make the prairie more
productive.
This year on average, the weather was warmer so it affected the biodiversity of
insects we caught and the biomass of our plants and insects. There may be more bugs
in the woods due to the climate this year. There was an extended warm summer and a
wetter season causing an change in biodiversity and environment as a whole. With
climate change there will be more and more anomalies and an increase in anomalies
will change the ecosystem. Anomalies are bleeding into insect and plant biodiversity
and there is strong evidence of this compared to previous years. This may be the
hottest weather based on global averages. The average summer high is 86 and it was
around 70 degrees in mid-October.
Some issues with this research is the anomalies affecting the amount of plants
and animals in the woods and prairie that we found. There may have also been errors in
our research due to the time of year that we did our research and found our plants. In
future research we should compare the evenness, biomass, richness and biodiversity of
all four reasons in each ecosystem and see how they change throughout the year and
change of weather.
I have concluded that expanding the prairie would more ecologically beneficial
based off the research conducted. The prairie has a higher biomass and is more
beneficial to our school and provide more services. If we increase the biomass of the
prairie there will be a higher amount of evenness compared to the woods. Both
ecosystems are ecologically and economically beneficial to our school. Expanding the
prairie would help the area around it and be the most beneficial overall.
Work Cited
1. Cardinale, B. Duffy, J. Gonzalez, A. Hooper, D. Perrings, C. Venail, P. Narwani, A.
Mace, G. Tilman, D. Wardle, D. Biodiversity loss and its impact on humanity.
Nature. 2012. June 07; 486:5967.
2. Mazancourt C, Isbell F, Larocque A, Berendse F, De Luca E, Haegeman B, Polley H,