The Diversity and Abundance of Insects in Danby Woods Based on the Moisture Levels of the Soil

On October 19 and October 26, 2015, ths students from Bailey Hewitt's laboratory 01, in Christopher Lortie's BIOL 2050 class, went to Danby Woods to do group research. The class was split into groups of 4, except for my group which consisted of 5 students: myself, Antoni, Taylor, Hinal, and Amena. The five of us decided to collect insect abundance and disversity in the grassland and woodlot regions of Danby Woods using qudrats. We also wanted to see whether moisture in the soil would affect the number of insects we saw in certain regions of the woods. We planned on taking 60 quadrats, for a total of 120, per day and looking at each quadrat for 5 minutes. We used the random numbers website to determine how many steps we should take to reach our next experimental site. Four of us took four quadrats, doing 7-8 procedures each, while one person took the moisture meter and measured the moisture of each of our quadrats. On day 1, the weather was approximately 14 degrees Celsius and partly cloudy, with a wind speed of 26 km per hour and a humidity of 49%. This day not as many insects were witnessed, both in high moisture and low moisture levels. This could be because of the weather that day, it was extremely windy and somewhat cold. On day 2, the weather was approximately 9 degrees Celsius, with a wind speed of 14 km per hour and 57% humidity. On this day, it was also evident that moisture did not play a critical role in the abundance and diversity of insects, as the moisture levels did not correlate with an increase or decrease in insects. Again, the weather was chilly that day, but it was not as windy as it was on day 1. Although, it is certain that the woodlot had much less diversity and abundance than the grassland, but because the data was not consistent it is difficult to connect.2015年10月19日与10月26日，克里斯托弗·洛蒂（Christopher Lortie）所授BIOL 2050课程的学生们，在贝利·休伊特（Bailey Hewitt）01实验室的指导下，前往丹比森林（Danby Woods）开展小组研究活动。该课程班级以4人为单位分组，唯有笔者所在小组共有5名成员：笔者本人、安东尼（Antoni）、泰勒（Taylor）、希纳尔（Hinal）与阿梅娜（Amena）。我们5人决定采用样方（quadrat）法，在丹比森林的草原与林地生境中采集昆虫丰度与多样性数据，并探究土壤湿度是否会对森林特定区域内的昆虫数量产生影响。 我们计划每日布设60个样方，两日总计120个，且对每个样方开展5分钟的观测。我们借助随机数网站确定前往下一个实验样地所需的步数。小组内四名成员各负责4个样方，每人需完成7至8次采样操作，剩余一人则使用土壤湿度计测定每个样方的土壤湿度。 首日气温约为14摄氏度，天气为多云间晴，风速达26公里/小时，相对湿度49%。当日无论是高湿度还是低湿度区域，观测到的昆虫数量均较少，这或与当日天气有关：当日风力极强且气温偏低。 次日气温约为9摄氏度，风速14公里/小时，相对湿度57%。当日同样可见，土壤湿度并未对昆虫丰度与多样性产生显著影响，因湿度水平与昆虫数量的增减并无关联。当日气温依旧偏低，但风力较首日有所减弱。尽管可以确定林地生境的昆虫多样性与丰度远低于草原生境，但由于数据并不一致，难以建立明确的关联。