Population Growth Lab
Populations of different species interact with their environment in a myriad of ways. This may also impact the population, especially concerning its size. The question trying to be answered was how changes in the amount and nature of the plant life available in an ecosystem does, in fact, influence herbivore population growth over time. Answering this question will determine which environmental factor has the greatest impact on the population growth of herbivores. In this lab the herbivores, are rabbits, and the plant life is grass and weeds. A simulation was done to answer this question and to provide proof for an argument.
The higher the grass energy is, the greater the population growth will be overtime. The reason …show more content…
During the investigation, the control consisted of the rabbit number population to be 150, the grass grows rate to be 15, the weed grow rate to be 0, the grass energy to be 5, the weed energy to be 0. These factors then changed the population of rabbits from 150 to 221. For the experiment, the energy levels of grass were set to 15. Besides the energy levels of grass, every other variable was kept constant. This resulted in the population of rabbits growing from 150 to 495. In addition, during the experiment, if increasing the grass-growth rate to 20 and leaving the grass energy level at 5, the population of the rabbits was 316. But, increasing the grass energy levels to 10 and keeping the grass-growth rate at 20, the population of the rabbits was 689. Other than these variables, the rest of the variables remained constant. The control included the population of the rabbits being in 150, the birth-threshold to remain at 15, and both the weed growth rate and weed energy at 0. In addition, the simulation was done in this way to single out variables and use the given data to better understand the effects of the specific variable alone, in this case, the energy. With these results, it is shown compared with multiple other experiments that increasing the amount of energy in the grass influenced the rabbit population growth over
Populations of different species interact with their environment in a myriad of ways. This may also impact the population, especially concerning its size. The question trying to be answered was how changes in the amount and nature of the plant life available in an ecosystem does, in fact, influence herbivore population growth over time. Answering this question will determine which environmental factor has the greatest impact on the population growth of herbivores. In this lab the herbivores, are rabbits, and the plant life is grass and weeds. A simulation was done to answer this question and to provide proof for an argument.
The higher the grass energy is, the greater the population growth will be overtime. The reason …show more content…
During the investigation, the control consisted of the rabbit number population to be 150, the grass grows rate to be 15, the weed grow rate to be 0, the grass energy to be 5, the weed energy to be 0. These factors then changed the population of rabbits from 150 to 221. For the experiment, the energy levels of grass were set to 15. Besides the energy levels of grass, every other variable was kept constant. This resulted in the population of rabbits growing from 150 to 495. In addition, during the experiment, if increasing the grass-growth rate to 20 and leaving the grass energy level at 5, the population of the rabbits was 316. But, increasing the grass energy levels to 10 and keeping the grass-growth rate at 20, the population of the rabbits was 689. Other than these variables, the rest of the variables remained constant. The control included the population of the rabbits being in 150, the birth-threshold to remain at 15, and both the weed growth rate and weed energy at 0. In addition, the simulation was done in this way to single out variables and use the given data to better understand the effects of the specific variable alone, in this case, the energy. With these results, it is shown compared with multiple other experiments that increasing the amount of energy in the grass influenced the rabbit population growth over