Environmental Lab Skills

Mitzy Munoz nd 2 Period AP Environmental Science September 24, 2013

Background: The background of this experiment/lab will help the students understand some of the basic skills involved in environmental research. The project background discuss about the research on endemic carnivores of Madagascar. The research team main objective was to conduct trapping surveys to locate and identify the carnivore populations and trends in the area of Ankarafantisika National Park, and collect anatomical data on each species of carnivore at this site. In addition, the lab was conducted to establish baseline indicatives of relative abundance of Cryptoprocia ferox and additional carnivore populations in the dry, deciduous forests of Ankarafantsika.

Purpose/Objectives: The Environmental Lab Skills objective is to work with metric units and to review the purpose of the lab work, and the general lab methods. In addition, the objective is to also create and analysis graphs from collected data. The primary purpose of this research is to investigate and identify how both endemic and invasive predators divide their resources and otherwise effect one another provides information to increase understanding of both ecological and conservation issues relating to the real world. The independent variables are the males and females, while the dependent variables are the measurements.

Hypothesis: Every human is made differently, and so, the measurements of the body parts of each males and females are different from each other.

Materials: Ruler, Measurement Tape, Sand, Cup/Beaker, Graduated Cylinder

Procedures: 1. Create a data table with 9 columns and 9 rows, listed on the top of each column: Name, Gender, Height, Wrist by self, Wrist by partner, Neck by self, Neck by partner, Hand to Hand, and Volume cupped hand. 2. Write down your height in cm. 3. Use measuring tape to measure the circumference of your neck and wrist. 4. Pick a partner to help measure the circumference of your neck and wrist 5. Record the measurements of each other, but dont let your partner know their measurements. 6. With your partner, calculate the volume of sand that fit in your cupped-hands. (Use graduated cylinder to find the volume in cm) 7. Repeat step 6 for your partner. 8. Record all your measurement on to the class data chart. 9. Copy all the information about all your classmates into the class data table.

Results: I Name II Gender III Height IV Wrist (S) Mitzy Female 164cm 15.5cm V Wrist (P) 15.5cm VI Neck (S) 36cm VII Neck (P) 36cm VIII IX

Hand to Volume Hand 15.5cm Cupped 6cm^2

Conclusion: 1. The relationship between height and hand to hand distance displays or identify the height you are. The bigger the measurements of your hand to hand is the taller you are and the smaller the measurements of your hand to hand the shorter you are. 2. The differences between the wrist circumference of males and females were the majority of males have bigger wrist circumferences compared to the females. Although, it depends on the thickness of your wrist, so it wouldnt matter if it were male or female. I wouldnt be able to identify the gender. 3. The differences between the cupped hand volume of males and females were completely different from each other. Even though if its a male or a female, it depends on how big the hands of the person is to be able to cut the amount they have measured. I wouldnt be able identify the gender depending on the calculation of the hand cupped of sand. Base on the data, my volume of sand was much larger than half of the males in the class. 4. If the measurements that my partner recorded might be slightly different, because of in-accurate measurements of the way they place the measuring tape. Its important to keep in mind that not all data that was tested would be precise, it would be close but not always the exact answer.