Are you suggesting that evolutionary adaptation occurs over the lifespan of an individual, juvie?
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Ideas?
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juvenissun
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How long is the life of a budworm? How long the experiment could be? If the time frame is not adequate, then it would be another obvious design flaw.
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toirewadokodesuka
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viruses building immunity to anti-biotics when not taken properly
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The answer to your questions is: It doesn't matter. anonymous1515 is concerned with evolutionary adaptation, which does not occur over a single individual lifespan. It occurs over the evolution of a lineage (read: multiple generations). You appear to be confusing evolutionary adaptation with behavioural plasticity. This is why I said you don't know what you're talking about.
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juvenissun
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I know what I am talking about.
You do not know what I am talking about.
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Hey Juvie. I appreciate your consideration. Budworm usually live for about a year. The adult moths lay eggs in the late summer, and then the larvae overwinter in the crevasses of pine trees. In the spring, they come out of their hibernation, and begin feeding on pine trees. Eventually, they become moths and the process starts over again
For the purposes of this project, you don't really have to worry about how long they live. For example, if I am testing to see what adaptive trait allows budworm to survive rainstorms, I would measure the trait (lets say body size) before a rainstorm, and then measure the trait after the rainstorm. If, for example, small budworm cannot handle rain as well, then I would see only larger budworm surviving after the rainstorm. As such, I would be able to conclude that large body size (or perhaps something correlated with it) would be an adaptive trait to aid in survival in harsh weather.
As for the time frame of the project...at this stage, I'm just writing a hypothetical pre-proposal. So, I could write a proposal that outlines a project that lasts 20 years if I want. However, since that sort of project would almost certainly not be funded, I am probably going to stick with a project I can carry out within 1 year.
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Yeah, you're right. To study an evolutionary adaptation, we don't necessarily have to breed thousands of generations of individuals (which I think juvie might have been thinking). Instead, we can measure selective pressures on the system and determine what forces are likely to have shaped certain traits in the species. And we can even do this within the course of one generation!
I agree with you Juvie - it would be much more informative if we could breed budworm over many many generations. We would be able to greatly advance our understanding of the subject. Unfortunately, I'd like to graduate in the near future, so that methodology is out of the equation.
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Ok, so here is my current thought process....
Background
The jack pine budworm (Choristoneura pinus pinus) is the most important insect predator of jack pine trees, and tends to reproduce episodically with major outbreaks occurring every 8-12 years (McCullough 2000). Budworm moths lay eggs on pine needles in the late summer months. Eggs hatch one to two weeks later, and budworm larvae move into crevasses in the pine bark, where they overwinter (Robison et al. 1998). It has been observed that budworm moths tend to lay eggs on older jack pine needles rather than on younger needles (McCullough 2000), and that female budworm moths discriminate between needles based on cuticular wax, but the purpose of this discrimination is unknown.
Question: is ovipositing on older spruce needles an adaptive trait?
Hypotheses:
[FONT="]Older needles tend to be wider, longer, and stiffer than younger needles. In addition, older needles tend to have a thinner cuticle than young needles, which may allow for better adhesion by egg masses. I hypothesize that eggs that are laid on older pine needles are less likely to be washed away by rain and wind than eggs that are laid on softer, younger pine needles. As such, in adverse weather conditions moths that oviposit on older needles are selected for, since their larvae are more likely to survive adverse weather.[/FONT]
[FONT="]Predictions:[/FONT]
[FONT="]If ovipositing on older needles is an adaptive behaviour to ensure egg survival in adverse weather conditions, then after rainfall there should be more eggs retained on older needles than on younger needles.[/FONT]
[FONT="]Methods:[/FONT]
[FONT="] A young jack pine stand will be chosen for the study. 100 jack pine trees will be chosen from the stand at random. A random branch will be selected from the mid-upper crown of each tree. Needles will be removed from branches to yield four treatments: only four, three, two, and one year-old foliage remaining (jackpine trees typically keep about 4 years worth of foliage on their branches, so I have about 4 ages of needles to work with). One adult female moth and three adult male moths will be placed into a branch sleeve cage, which will then be placed around the treatment branches. Once ovipositing has occurred, sleeve cages will be removed. Branches will be collected, and number off eggs laid will be recorded for each branch. Then, branches from each treatment will be washed with water for a specific amount of time. Eggs will be counted again after washing, and percentage remaining will be recorded.[/FONT]
[FONT="]Anticipated Results[/FONT]
[FONT="] If the hypothesis is supported, I predict that a higher percentage of eggs laid on older needles will remain after washing than those laid on younger foliage (Fig. 2).[/FONT]
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As for the washing of the branches, it just seems too artificial. I wonder if there is a way to make the project a little more natural. Ideally, I would like to count the number of eggs before a rainstorm, and count the number of eggs after a rainstorm, and see if older foliage retains more eggs. However, in practice it is quite difficult to count those tiny eggs in the field.
Background
The jack pine budworm (Choristoneura pinus pinus) is the most important insect predator of jack pine trees, and tends to reproduce episodically with major outbreaks occurring every 8-12 years (McCullough 2000). Budworm moths lay eggs on pine needles in the late summer months. Eggs hatch one to two weeks later, and budworm larvae move into crevasses in the pine bark, where they overwinter (Robison et al. 1998). It has been observed that budworm moths tend to lay eggs on older jack pine needles rather than on younger needles (McCullough 2000), and that female budworm moths discriminate between needles based on cuticular wax, but the purpose of this discrimination is unknown.
Question: is ovipositing on older spruce needles an adaptive trait?
Hypotheses:
[FONT="]Older needles tend to be wider, longer, and stiffer than younger needles. In addition, older needles tend to have a thinner cuticle than young needles, which may allow for better adhesion by egg masses. I hypothesize that eggs that are laid on older pine needles are less likely to be washed away by rain and wind than eggs that are laid on softer, younger pine needles. As such, in adverse weather conditions moths that oviposit on older needles are selected for, since their larvae are more likely to survive adverse weather.[/FONT]
[FONT="]Predictions:[/FONT]
[FONT="]If ovipositing on older needles is an adaptive behaviour to ensure egg survival in adverse weather conditions, then after rainfall there should be more eggs retained on older needles than on younger needles.[/FONT]
[FONT="]Methods:[/FONT]
[FONT="] A young jack pine stand will be chosen for the study. 100 jack pine trees will be chosen from the stand at random. A random branch will be selected from the mid-upper crown of each tree. Needles will be removed from branches to yield four treatments: only four, three, two, and one year-old foliage remaining (jackpine trees typically keep about 4 years worth of foliage on their branches, so I have about 4 ages of needles to work with). One adult female moth and three adult male moths will be placed into a branch sleeve cage, which will then be placed around the treatment branches. Once ovipositing has occurred, sleeve cages will be removed. Branches will be collected, and number off eggs laid will be recorded for each branch. Then, branches from each treatment will be washed with water for a specific amount of time. Eggs will be counted again after washing, and percentage remaining will be recorded.[/FONT]
[FONT="]Anticipated Results[/FONT]
[FONT="] If the hypothesis is supported, I predict that a higher percentage of eggs laid on older needles will remain after washing than those laid on younger foliage (Fig. 2).[/FONT]
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As for the washing of the branches, it just seems too artificial. I wonder if there is a way to make the project a little more natural. Ideally, I would like to count the number of eggs before a rainstorm, and count the number of eggs after a rainstorm, and see if older foliage retains more eggs. However, in practice it is quite difficult to count those tiny eggs in the field.
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juvenissun
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The timing thing is from Mallon. I was just reply to his question which is not related to what I said to you.
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I know you're not talking about evolutionary adaptation. Because evolutionary adaptation, which is what concerns anonymous1515, occurs over more than one generation. By definition, it has to.
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Yeah, that's correct. Even behaviours (which occur during the life of one individual) can have evolutionary origins. For example, out of 100 individuals, 10 may be exceptionally aggressive. If the aggressive behaviour in those individual is beneficial (and hereditary), then over time the population will become more aggressive.
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