Will Mann

Bird Beak Lab Report

Pre-Lab Questions/Answers:

1. How did the original bird species arrive in Hawaii?

a. Wind, Waves, and Wings
2. Native Hawaiian Species are also called ___________ species.
a. Endemic
3. What was the original bird species in Hawaii? What group of birds are found on the
islands now?
a. Hawaiian Honeycreepers
b. Flycatcher, Elepaio, and some species of the Hawk
4. What is adaptive radiation?
a. When a species evolves and radiates into a new species after it has arrived
somewhere else

Hypothesis:

If I test which bird beak will be the most effective in this experiment, then I think that the spoon
bird beak will do the best in adapting to the different islands because it is able to hold more at a
time and can scoop up food.

Procedure:

1. As you visit each island, record what the food sources is (such as beans, paper, etc.)
2. Using your tool, pick up as many pieces of food as possible. After collecting the food you
must put it in your cup (represents eating the food)
3. After 20 seconds, count the food collected
4. Record the amount of food collected
5. Repeat twice and find the average for the two trials
6. Move onto the next station and repeat steps 1-5 again for the 5 stations
Data:
*Cup weight was 11.6 grams and was already subtracted out of measurements*

Type of Beak Island 1 - Island 2 - Island 3 - Island 4 - Island 5 -

Rice Sunflower Lentils Paper Gummy
Seeds Worms

Spoon 112.6 grams 14.3 grams 74.5 grams 13.1 grams 85.8 grams

Spoon 119.6 grams 15.9 grams 105.8 grams 17.1 grams 120.4 grams

AVERAGE 115.1 grams 15.1 grams 90.15 grams 15.1 grams 103.1 grams

Results and Discussion:

This lab relates to natural selection because natural selection is what allows species that can
adapt to their environment to survive and those that can’t adapt to die off. In this lab, I used the
spoon beak. A bird with this beak would be most suited to survive where there is rice, lentils, or
gummy worms available for them to eat. If there was competition with their birds for the food on
each island then it would be harder to get enough food because it would be taken by other
birds. My beak was most successful in picking up the rice because it was able to be scooped up
in the spoon. Also, rice is very small so it is easy to get a lot of it in one scoop. In total, my
spoon bird beak was able to pick up an average of 115.1 grams.

Conclusion:

In this experiment we were testing to see which bird beak would be the most effective at
collecting food from 5 different islands. This simulated natural selection because the beaks that
did not collect very much food were less likely to survive. My hypothesis was correct because I
said that the spoon beak would be the most effective, and it was. My data also showed that this
spoon beak bird would be able to survive on multiple islands. My bird would have done the best
on the rice, gummy worm, and lentil islands. My bird was however selected against on the paper
and sunflower seed islands.