Migration




BIO226 : Community : Community Patterns : Migration

Exercise: Migration

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1. Migration contributes to a cyclic (seasonal) pattern in community organization. What changes in community structure would you expect to be affected by migrants? Explain.

2. Migration ties different ecological communities together. Sometimes organisms which feed in one ecological community provide food for the predators of another.

a) Wildebeest migrate through the Serengeti and other nearby ecological communities. What hypothesis can you suggest to explain what condition prompts the wildebeest to migrate?

b) What predators benefit from the wildebeest's foraging in adjacent ecological communities?

3. Some species migrate between breeding grounds and feeding grounds. At each location it seems that some condition prevents a stage in the life history from surviving there. North pacific humpback whales spend the summer in the arctic and the winter near Hawaii. What hypotheses can you suggest to explain what the condition is in each location that prevents the whales from spending the whole year there?

4. Pick a migratory species. Possible places to look are migratory bird research at the Patuxent Wildlife Research Center, shorebirds, sharks, cranes, North American breeding birds, birds of prey, caribou, monarch butterfly, European Lepidoptera, Australian animals, various North American birds, hummingbirds, and herring. List the migratory species in the assignment database. Make sure your migratory species is not already listed in the assignment database.

a) What is the migratory pattern of the species you picked? What source(s) did you use?

b) To what conditions of the two ecological communities at the end of the migration route does the migratory behavior seem to adapt the species? What source(s) did you use?

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