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- Abstract
- Mr. Posgai’s Biology II class often pondered the thought of insects’
- attraction to certain colors on flowers. Well, on September 14, 1999, we decided to
- experiment and figure out which colors on flowers were more dominant over
- others. Our Biology class divided up into groups of two and three people. Each
- group took a different colored piece of poster board. One person in each group
- applied Tangle Trap to the twelve by nine inch area and stapled each board to a
- piece of lattice. We then took the lattice outside, about fifty feet from the school
- building and left it outdoors for about forty-eight hours. When we retrieved our
- lattice, we counted the number of insects on each board and proved our hypothesis,
- that insects prefer yellow flowers and white flowers over the other colors, to be
- true.
- Introduction
- During the week of September 13, through September 17, Mr. Posgai’s
- Biology II class carried out an interesting experiment involving insects and their
- color attractions.
- Pollination is vital to insect and flower reproduction. Birds and insects drift
- from flower to flower, selecting the appropriate “flavor” of their choice to carry on
- their necessary task of nature. With the way nature works, this process sounds to be
- simple; however, it is much more complicated and in a sense, more unbelievable
- than you could ever imagine. A bird or insect flies or walks up into the flower to
- reach the pollen. As time moves o, that same bird and/or insect will move on to
- something else and carry the pollen with it. The pollen being transferred like this is
- a major factor in the flower reproduction system.
- My class came up with the hypothesis that the insects would be most
- attracted to the colors of yellow and white. Our hypothesis was proved to be true
- when we brought in the lattice containing all of the individual colored poster board
- pieces. The results were not surprising to us, as white had gathered eighty three
- insects and yellow gathering eighty. These colors together almost are more than the
- rest of the colors’ insect amount combined.
- Materials and Methods
- -9 Different color poster boards:
- red, blue, yellow, white, purple, green, black, orange, and hot pink
- -Tangle Trap
- -Putty knife
- -Pencil
- -Ruler
- -Lattice
- -2 sticks
- Everyone in the class first divided up into groups of three and four people.
- Each group chose a 14” by 11” piece of poster board of a different color. They
- took the ruler and marked off with the pencil, approximately a one inch border for
- handling. With the putty knife at hand, they applied the Tangle Trap to the middle
- of the board, being careful not to let it get on their hands or clothing. Handling the
- piece of poster board by the one inch border on the sides, each group carefully took
- their board and stapled it to the lattice. The lattice was then placed outside (being
- held up by the two sticks) with all nine different colored poster boards stapled on
- it, with each piece having a 12” by 9” available trapping space. After about
- forty-eight hours, they retrieved the lattice and each group took back their assigned
- color and counted the number of insects on it.
- Discussion/Conclusion
- After retrieving our lattice board from outside, and carefully counting over
- and over, for reassurance, the total amount of insects on each piece of poster board,
- and the different types, our class came to the final conclusion that yellow, white,
- and red were the more dominant colors in this particular experiment. Although, this
- did not exactly match our hypothesis, the results were close.
- Also, you must take in to consideration when reading this conclusion that we
- only made one trial. During a normal experiment, there should be more than one
- test. Afterall, if is hard to determine the facts of nature with multiple experiments,
- let alone just one.
- There could also be many other factors which affected our results. An
- example would be that not everyone calculated exactly a one inch border from the
- sides of their poster board. Some people may have put the Tangle Trap on their
- board thicker than others, which would lead to more or less insects sticking to their
- particular poster board. Another factor may be that the group who was in charge of
- the purple poster board had to color a plain white piece. Meaning that the board
- may not be completely purple, and the insects may be attracted to the white spots
- showing through the colored board.
- <br><br>
- Words: 753
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