Taxa Scavenger Hunt Template

Sara Smith and iNat sara_smith3 I. Introduction Biodiversity is essential to keep the natural balance. Documentation over time is key to understanding a particular area's ecology and how to maintain balance in the future. The population is projected to grow exponentially over the next couple of decades, contributing to the ecological deficit. Suburbanization will continue to diminish the flora and fauna in developing regions and must be watched carefully to maintain conservational efforts. The Taxa Scavenger Hunt is divided into six sections and was conducted by the Ecology Laboratory to help students grasp and understand how to document taxa and observe wildlife to help with future conservation efforts. It is essential to comprehend the meaning of flora and fauna to appreciate their relevance to the environment. Flora and fauna are important for human survival because they regulate the levels of oxygen and carbon dioxide within the atmosphere. They also provide us with food, drink, and medications. While gathering species for the taxa scavenger hunt, I chose two locations due to the vast difference between the flora and fauna that are held in each location. I hadn't explored either of the location that I used before the scavenger hunt. The first location was around the environmental building, where students frequently walk, and cars often drive by. The area had a small Man- made waterfall stream into a small man-made pond. The area had a few trees and large bushes, but no hills, or slopes around. The second location I chose is Prairie remnant with a large freshwater pond, the area has clay soil on the mostly flat ground covered in rocks. While gathering data I used an application called iNaturalist or iNat for short. To document the organisms that I found. By participating in the Taxonomic Scavenger Hunt assignment during the spring 3

Sara Smith and iNat sara_smith3 Materials and Methodology To start off my Taxa Scavenger Hunt, I observed the flora and fauna on and around the UNT campus, while following the instructions provided in the ecology laboratory manual. I was instructed to locate and identify 15 categories of flora and fauna. To help identify I used the application inaturalist (accessed February 2023) an application created by the natural geographic society and the California academy of sciences to help document and identify wildlife all around the world. For the data collected during the scavenger hunt I used wunderground (wunderground.com) and greencast (greencastonline.com). to get vital information on the weather in the areas used for this project. Table 2. Materials utilized to generate the Ecology Laboratory Taxa Scavenger Hunt template. Item manufacturer purpose Microsoft Word Microsoft word processor software camera iPhone document wildlife iNaturalist app California Academy of Sciences and natural geographic society document and identify wildlife greencast website green cast used to find year to date 6

“A total of thirteen taxa were documented at the Environmental Science Building on 10-II-2023 (Table 5). The taxa documented include three kingdoms, four phyla, seven classes, and twelve orders, twelve families, eleven genus, and eight species.” Kingdom phylum class order family genus species common name scavenger hunt # Plantae Lamiales lamiaceae lamium L. amplexicaule Henbit deadnettle 1 Rosales moraceae maclura M. pomifera Osage orange 2 rosaceae prunus P. mexicana Mexican plum 16.A fungi Agaricales schizophyllaceae schixophyllum S. commune Splitgill mushroom 4 animalia Mollusca Bivalvia venerida cyreidae corbicula C. fluminea Asian clam 5 Arthropoda Arachnida Araneae desidae metaltella M. Simoni South American toothed hackle mesh weaver 7 incecta hymenoptera formicidae solenopsis S. invicta Red imported fire ant 11 lepidoptera psychidae thyridopteryx T. ephemeraeformis Evergreen bagworm 16.F dermaptera anisolabididae Euborellia Genus euborellia 16.H diplopoda polydesmida Flat-backed millipedes 12 crustacea decapoda cambaridae procambarus Cray fish 14 annelida clitellata opisthopora lumbricidae Earth worm 13 Chordata Aves passeriformes turdidar Turdus Typical thrushes 8 Table 5. Observational data from (Denton Co. Texas

IV. Discussion How does the ecoregion affect the population of your taxa? How does seasonality and temperature (or perception or YTD GDD) affect your taxa? Are your taxa hindered by rapid urbanization, or is it a cosmopolitan taxa which can utilize many habitat types? How do the abiotic factors influence feeding and reproduction? Why are the trees dormant this time of year? What does it mean when a fungus has a typical mushroom like cap extending out of the ground? How does growing degree days affect the abundance of insects you found? V. References iNat observations