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Arundinaria tecta, or (evergreen) switch cane, classified under the tribe Arundinarieae, is one of three native species of bamboo found in North America.
Common in the bottomlands, the switch cane seen here is in a Jacksonville, NC neighborhood, living by a small rivulet that provides it with its required water intake. With its high water intake, switch cane is highly tolerant of flooding, and because of its presence of rhizomes, it is tolerant of fire as well.
The holly bush (Ilex opaca) presents with sharp leaves that help protect it from predators. Predation is defined as one animal or plant feeding or attacking another. Many plants and animals have defense mechanisms against this.
This is a lichen, an example of mutualistic symbiosis. The lichen is not a single organism. It is known as a composite organism because two species, a fungus and an alga (sometimes cyanobacteria), are shown living together and depending upon each other for survival. Fungi are not photosynthetic, rather, they are decomposers. But algae are photosynthetic so they provide food for the fungus while the fungus provides safety and shelter for the algae. I think this lichen is a member of species Flavoparmelia caperata. This picture was taken on January 30, 2017, and this specific lichen lives on the trunk of a tree near the Crossing on campus.
Sources:
Both plants are succulents, which means that they have fleshy tissue that sustains water. I keep them both in my room, but I put them on the porch a few times a week to give them more sunlight and fresh air. The top plant is a barrel cactus, specifically an Echinocactus. The environmental resources are relatively simple; it needs direct sunlight and does not need to be watered frequently. An environmental condition that is important is humidity because in the presence of high humidity it will rot. The bottom plant is commonly known as a panda plant, but the scientific name is Kalanchoe tomentosa. Some environmental conditions it requires would be that the temperature range are between 60-75°F and humidity is average but can tolerate dry air. The resources it requires consist of a balance of direct and indirect sunlight, diluted fertilizer once every 4 weeks from spring until summer, and very little water. You only need to water it when the soil becomes dry. Also, you can cut off one of the leaves, re-pot it, and it will begin rooting within 4 weeks. #UNCW #ecology #bio366 #uncwteal #Sp2017 #image1
This photo was taken on Saturday, April 15 at my roommate’s parents’ house in Wilmington. We spent Saturday watering their large garden and my job was to pull the weeds! Nothing says Happy Easter quite like that! It then dawned on me to use these weeds for my last eco-photo. I later researched and identified the weed to be an annual bluegrass, Poa annua. This is the most common and widely distributed weed which has adapted to a large variety of climates and soil conditions. It is known to grow in poor drainage areas. This corresponds to the area of garden I was working on since the natural “soil” was mainly clay which retains a lot of water. His mom had to bring in her own sand to put on top. She laid black tarps on top of the trouble areas in attempt to kill them; however, the poor drainage and nutrients allowed them to thrive even with limited sunlight. It is one of the most invasive and difficult to control due to its diverse genetic make-up. In the southern United States, it is a winter annual which would explain why they are present now as we head toward the summer season. Hope they do not come to a garden near you!
Behold, the carpet beetle (Anthrenus verbasci). This one was milling around on my bed and I thought it looked cool. Little did I know, these guys are extremely common household pests. It is actually the most abundant organism in the building "ecosystem." They can eat any plant or animal goods around the house, but prefer fibrous material. Their larvae do the most damage, though. Carpet beetle larvae are the #1 destroyers of dry insect and animal specimens in museums. Also most of this species lifespan is spent in the larval stage. But all is not as well as it seems for the carpet beetle larvae. Their natural predator is a parasitoid wasp, Laelius pedatus. The wasp paralyzes the larva and lays eggs within it. The wasp larvae feed on and eventually kill the beetle larva. Crazy! The larvae do actually have a constitutive defense. Irritating hairs on the larvae help deter the wasp, but these usually do not work. Recently, these wasps have been found in the Natural History Museum in London. This indicates that they must have a large enough population of carpet beetles to support the parasitoid. I find it amazing how ecology establishes itself, even indoors.
Sources:
www.researchgate.net/publication/307509436_IPM_News_The_p...
www.the-piedpiper.co.uk/th8f.htm
insectsinthecity.blogspot.com/2010/03/anthrenus-verbasci-...
This is a slide of preserved marine diatoms taken in my Marine Biology Class. Diatoms are a diverse group that includes both autotrophs and heterotrophs. They make up a large percentage of phytoplankton and are an important food source for many zooplankton which in turn sustains larger organisms. Most organisms in the ocean are dependent on diatoms either directly or indirectly. Diatom are also responsible for up to a quarter of all photosynthesis on our planet. They help to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide.
Bear with me--these old shoes are more interesting than they seem! I almost forgot about these Vans, my once favorite pair of shoes, after leaving them on my patio for almost over a year (I know, pretty gross, but I have a bad memory) until I stumbled across them in the corner today. I placed them outside all that time ago because they got soaked in beer at a concert I attended and I meant to air them out. What I noticed today was that they have been serving a purpose this whole time, just not to me. My best guess is that, in combination with the common processes of sun exposure, the canvas of the shoes has been stripping away and discoloring due to the colonization and decomposition of/from bacteria--ecological concepts sometimes too small to witness! Since bacteria favor settling in warm, moist, and often sedentary environments, these shoes became a perfect home for (what appears to be) algae and undoubtedly various bacteria given that the leftover beer didn't just get up and walk away! While the shoes were pretty beaten up beforehand, the residue from that night and accumulated dirt/dust from just being outside and in one spot for so long caused a hotspot for many processes to occur. Though a bit gross and disappointing, I'm glad I noticed that my former favorite concert shoes ended up not only displaying classic patterns of weathering but exhibiting the many ways bacteria can affect the items around us sometimes being disguised as something else!
This photo was taken on Wrightsville Beach on 3/18/17. Seashells are extremely important for maintaining the health of a beach. However, as summer approaches, many tourists who visit the beach usually take multiple shells with them when they leave. Decreasing the number of seashells on beaches has detrimental effects. Shells have many ecological functions such as providing protection for hermit crabs, materials for bird nests, and nutrients (calcium carbonate for example) for the organisms that live on the shore when they break down. They also provide surfaces that some algae, sponges, and some sea grasses can cling to. Removing seashells from beaches can also lead to increased erosion.
I found this Cannonball jellyfish on Wrightsville Beach on March 25 while going for walk. I put the shell next to it in order to show how big this jellyfish, bigger than my head! This species of jellyfish, Stomolophus meleagris, is also known as the cabbage head jellyfish due to its shape. They're relatively harmless in that their stings are very mild. After doing further research on this species of jellyfish, I was surprised to learn that they are commercially fished. I related this back to Dr. Long’s discussion on fishing for Lionfish due to their invasive species status and the abundance of them. These jellyfish, although not an invasive species, have more recently been commercially fished in Georgia due to the fact that they usually appear in fishermen’s nets without purpose. A normally ignored species common to the East Coast of North America is now being shipped across the globe to Japan and China where jellyfish is a common dish. I found this extremely interesting because I’ve never considered jellyfish fishing to be a big industry. But now, ‘jellyball’ fishing is the third largest commercial fishing export.
This snake was photographed on 27/3 in the Greenhouse Bay on the UNCW campus. One feature of the snake that isn't very discernible in this picture is that its eyes are located on the sides of its head. This brings up the question of the role of vision in prey detection and capture. Since the snake doesn't have forward facing eyes it doesn't have the advantages of binocular vision when striking at prey. As a result the prey that the snake captures has to be relatively close to it since it doesn't have good depth perception. In addition the snake likely has round pupils and more cones than rods in its eyes since it's diurnal instead of nocturnal.
This image depicts one of 104 wind turbines that span from Pasquotank to Perquimans county. This wind farm, known as the Amazon Wind Farm US East, is the first utility-scale wind farm in NC. The wind in the environment causes the blades, that are connected to a generator, to rotate and produce electricity. There is a transformation of kinetic energy to electrical energy. These wind turbines in particular produce 208 megawatts of power, which can produce enough energy to power 60,000 homes. The wind farm is one example of an ecological service to humans (which also supports the Utilitarian view of the ecosystem that the ecosystem benefits us). The wind from the environment helps provide electricity, a necessity in day to day life for humans. The conversion from wind kinetic energy to the production of electricity also satisfies the first law of thermodynamics that energy is neither created nor destroyed. Simply, a transformation of energy occurs.
Additional Sources:
elizabethcitypasquotankedc.com/north-carolinas-first-wind...
This past weekend I finally made it to a coffee shop I had been dying to visit down at Wrightsville Beach. The Workshop is unique because it showcases and sells a line of jewelry from "FossilEra." As you can guess from this image, the collection is made up of various shark tooth necklaces ranging from the smaller Sandbar and Benedini to the massive (and extinct) Megalodon, one of which is pictured here (isn't it beautiful?!). As a coffee lover and shark enthusiast, I did not actually purchase this necklace for the sake of this assignment. However, while I was admiring this tooth I realized that the discoloration came not from human tampering like I initially thought (their own preservation tools perhaps), but from the natural fossilization process I realized I knew very little about. After doing a bit of research, I found that these fossilized teeth exist because of many ecological interactions. Sharks lose thousands of teeth in their lifetime and in order for them to become fossilized they must rather quickly be covered by sediment on the ocean floor. This covering protects the tooth from decaying due to limiting oxygen and bacterial exposure. This specific preservation is called "permineralization." Water seeps through the sediment and into pore spaces in the tooth, primarily calcite and silica, that preserve and fossilize the tooth as well as cause discoloration ranging from blacks and greys to reds and oranges. It turns out there is a natural response for pretty much everything!
Information gathered from www.flmnh.ufl.edu/fish/discover/sharks/fossil-sharks/foss...
This mushroom was found outside of friday hall on the UNCW campus on january 23 2017. I have identified it as American Caesar's Amanita (Amanita jacksonii) by using "The mushroom observer" and "mushroom appreciation". These mushrooms extend from eastern Quebec Canada to Mexico state of Hidalgo.
The ecological process comes from the type of mushroom, Mycorrhizal. This means they form symbiotic relationships with rootlets of surrounding trees. The mushroom covers the rootlets with a sheath and helps with nutrient and water absorption. The tree provides amino acids and sugars to the mushroom. The relationship is essential for both the tree and the mushrooms. mushrooms are unable to produce their own energy. They must rely on other organisms. (mushroom expert)
www.mushroomexpert.com/glossary.html#mycorrhizal
www.mushroom-appreciation.com/learning-about-mushrooms-in...
This picture was taken during spring break, and was found within the South Carolina aquarium in Charleston. This is a picture of Haliaeetus leucocephalus or the Bald Eagle. The bald eagle photographed is named Liberty, who was damaged in the wild due to a collision and is unable to fly. Bald eagles are secondary, apex predators who sit at the top of the food web within mountain ecosystems. Due to trophic cascades, changes made within the bottom of the web, can cause powerful, indirect interactions via bottom-up control. This can be clearly seen via the effects of DDT on Bald Eagle populations. After World War II DDT became a prevalent pesticide and insecticide, however its effects within the ecosystem was unknown. The DDT seeped into the watershed of the ecosystems, where plants and fish absorbed it. As apex predators, the eagles would consume prey which contained DDT and therefore become heavily poisoned due to bioaccumulation. The DDT inhibited a chemical property of the egg shell and caused it to become weak and brittle, and when the eagle would roost and sit on the egg, the eggs would break. Today, DDT is banned, but the new threat to eagle populations in AVM or Avian vacuolar myelinopathy. It is believed this deasease is passed from the invasive aquatic hydrilla plant to waterfowl and then the eagle, however this new disease is not well understood as the exact causative agent is still unknown to researchers. More information and sources can be found here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avian_vacuolar_myelinopathy & www.fws.gov/midwest/eagle/recovery/biologue.html & www.nwhc.usgs.gov/disease_information/avian_vacuolar_myel...
Here we have the Canada Goose, the most common bird we can see around our homes, especially after they have migrated south and end up on our campus where this picture was taken. Since we were on the topic predation, the best way to represent it is catch the goose doing what it must: eat. As you can see from the video, the goose is picking at the grass with its beak, showing that it is an herbivorous creature. It is possible the goose is trying to eat a few small insects which would technically make them omnivorous but it's a little too small to see. One unique thing about Canadian geese are their territoriality. Most of us who try to get close to a Canadian goose may end getting chased, even if we were minding our own business. That just proves how small a goose's territory can be and how easily it can be changed to the point that they'll chase after you when they feel you've intruded on them.
This photo was taken on January 20th at Wrightsville Beach. You can see the habitat the sand dunes provides for many plants. The vegetation has adapted to withstand high salt concentrations, sand that covers and uncovers its roots, and desiccation.
This picture was taken on Monday 1/23/17 at 10:34 AM just outside Friday Hall. The photo itself is a collection of water in an area below sea level from Sunday night's rain. This picture greatly describes the ecological concept of weather. Weather is the state of the atmosphere at a give time. That night, it was cloudy and rainy compared to the bright and sunny sky seen in the background, and it all accumulated into this ditch. It also shows the concept of precipitation which takes many forms such as rain. While not shown explicitly, there was presence of small insects striding across the water, and their occupying the area shows the concept of population.The picture also demonstrates the connection the Lithosphere has with the Hydrosphere. With the Lithosphere consisting of dirt and soil and Hydrosphere consisting of all water in any form, the two interact because the soil absorbs the water, providing nutrients for planets rooting in the ground. But since soil can take up a finite amount of water, it can lead to overflows, such as shown.
I took this picture while helping with some gardening in Chapel Hill, NC. I struggled to come up with the exact species of this millipede, I figure out that this millipede is most likely in the Polydesmida family. Millipedes are an important food source in the food chain, especially to beetles, shrews, hedgehogs, rodents, frogs, lizards, birds and turtles. Ants and spiders, in particular, avoid this kind of arthropod due to their unique defense mechanisms. Although we haven’t really started talking about predation in class, I found this to be a very interesting find. The Polydesmida order, also know as flat-backed millipedes, are know for their amazing defense mechanisms or predator defenses. The most common form of defense that millipedes are almost always thought to refer to when alarmed is to curl into a ball. Many animals use this defense or a form similar for predators, either playing dead, retreating into their shell, or curling up into a ball. Surprisingly though, this isn’t the millipedes main form of defense. Millipedes, when provoked by predators, commonly secrete hydrogen cyanide gas to repel predators. This extremely harmful gas was also commonly used as chemical warfare during World War I and World War II.
The purple pitcher plant (Sarracenia purpurea) is the most successful Sarracenia due to its vaster range of distribution.
Although they only grow to about 30cm long, they pack a big punch with their digestive enzymes, along with mutualistic microorganisms that aid the plant in digestion (USDA, Rice). Here we have S. purpurea in the process of digesting its latest meal. The stiff downward pointing hairs trap and further prevent the insect from escaping its rain-filled stomach (Rice). This photo was taken in the Bluethenthal Wildflower Preserve right here on campus.
Sources:
The Internation Carnivorous Plant Society
www.sarracenia.com/faq/faq5538.html
USDA: Forest Service
www.fs.fed.us/wildflowers/plant-of-the-week/sarracenia_pu...
Pictured here are three saucer magnolias (Magnolia x soulangeana) from the front of Friday Hall on the campus of UNCW. I took this picture on February 6, back before it became unseasonably warm, so all the trees on campus were just starting to bloom. Saucer magnolias flower in the early spring and are beautiful! These trees are characterized by their “porcelain” pink and white “goblet” shaped flowers. The species is seen as a “landscape show-stopper”. Most early blooming trees time their flowering off of changes in day length or temperature, both of which are factors in this region’s climate. Climate is an average of the weather conditions in an area over a long period of time. Microclimates refer to the climate of a much smaller zone, often only a few meters square. These three trees demonstrate a very simplistic example of microclimates. I noticed that each tree received different amounts of early morning sunlight because of the shade cast by the pines. The more shaded magnolias seem to be flowering later than those with more direct sunlight. Just a slight change in the climate can vary the life cycle of an organism. It was really interesting to see such a drastic difference in the same species only a few meters apart!
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