Science Homework Help

Hello. This essay / assignment requires an ecology specialist / tutor.

Type double-spaced, and use concise sentences; text is limited to 5 pages, not including additional pages of tables or graphs. Please restrict yourself to this page limit, as you will learn to write more concisely.

Your paper must include the following sections: Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, and, Comparative Analysis.

1. Introduction – one paragraph

State the objective of the field exercise. What questions were we trying to answer, and why are these important in ecology?

2. Methods – one long or a few paragraphs (Introduction & Methods combined should not be longer than 1.5 pages)

Accurately describe where and how sample points were located, and how the data were collected. To guide your level of detail, imagine that someone had to repeat your methodology in a similar forest.

3. Results – eight attached tables and one paragraph for each table, summarizing the main points

results to be highlighted from the table.

Use the merged data spreadsheet distributed to you to construct 8 tables, one for the point-quarter method and one for the plot method in each of the four forest blocks.

The Excel workbook contains the raw data as teams collected it in the field, and also initial manipulations and tables of the data to make your calculations easier. The four sheets of this Excel workbook are labeled for clarity.

The first two sheets have the raw data organized for your use to make spreadsheet calculations in each of the four tables that you should finish filling in and then attach to the draft of your paper. Note that the 2014 and 2016 data will be combined for analysis, as they are from the same Mixed Oak-Pine Forest block, and serve to increase sample size and our confidence in comparisons with other forest types.

In each of the four tables in the two Calculations spreadsheets, the rows are the tree species encountered for each method in each of the two vegetation types, arranged alphabetically. The cells of each of the tables allow calculation of the seven variables for each species shown on the “Table 6.5” page of your handout (the fourth page of the handout. From left to right, these columns are relative density, density, dominance, relative dominance, frequency, relative frequency and importance value. Tree densities are trees/ha, and all others show significant figures to the nearest 1/100ths (e.g., 33.1% and not 33% or 33.12%).

The narrative portions of this section should assist the reader in understanding what the data says. You should point out interesting values and help the reader ‘jump’ into the tables and interpret the data. Your narrative should be descriptive rather than explanatory. Focus your writing in this section on what the data shows, not why it shows this. Save analysis for the discussion section.

4. Discussion- approximately 2-3 pages

a. Contrast the results obtained by the two methods. Point out similarities and offer explanation(s) for differences. Critique the two methods in terms of their accuracy.

b. How well was the objective of the study addressed by the sampling methods? How might they be improved?

c. What are the differences in the three forest types that were sampled? Given the sampling design and the amount of data collected, how confident are you that these sample differences are real?

e. How would the results differ if you sampled a tropical forest with equal intensity or sampling effort?

5. Comparative Analysis Tree species diversity at Estabrook Woods – two graphs and <= 1 page of text

Construct two curves on one graph, one curve for each of the two methods for the Mixed Oak Forest 2015 dataset (these can be either done on a computer or graphed by hand). These are species-individual curves and are one way ecologists show the species richness or diversity in a forest. Plot “cumulative species” on the y-axis as a function of “cumulative individuals” on the x-axis. Use the merged data spreadsheet, and start with Team 1’s data to create 2 columns of numbers. One column is merely the running total of individuals recorded in either the point-quarter or belt data set; the total here should be the total number of trees sampled by all teams combined over all sample points or plots. The second column is the total number of unique tree species accumulated as you add individuals. Compare the curves and discuss reasons for their differences. In addition, discuss how these curves might differ from curves sampled from other forest types in XXX Woods.