11 Mar Natural Selection Assignment – Select a trait for a plant

Natural Selection Assignment!
Select a trait for a plant or animal. You do not have to know the truth about how this trait evolved. You are going to apply the steps of Natural selection and demonstrate how the trait might have evolved through natural selection.
Misconceptions about Natural Selection Read this before you attempt this assignment (Links to an external site.)
For your SCENARIO** Dogs are bred by humans so not a good choice for natural selection and Peacocks are a better choice for sexual selection than natural selection. Read the ‘Show Natural Selection Activity’ carefully and then submit your completed scenario. A scenario is a step by step telling of how this came to be using the STEPS of the natural selection PROCESS. If these steps are not apparent in your scenario YOU WILL NOT RECEIVE CREDIT. I am really serious about this. Students who rush through this assignment do not do well and do not receive credit – a big part of your grade is showing that you have studied the steps in the natural selection process and are now applying them to your example. REMEMBER your scenario doesn’t have to be what actually happened it only has to show a logical application of the steps of natural selection. DO NOT RESEARCH A PARTICULAR TRAIT OF A PARTICULAR SPECIES AND COPY WHAT YOU FIND – I guarantee you will not get credit for this type of response because you will not be writing about it in the way the assignment asks you to apply the steps. Remember Natural Selection is a process. so your job is to show that you understand the steps in this process by applying the steps to a specific trait for a specific animal or plant do not talk about more than one trait. For example, don’t write about a lion’s claws and it’s size just choose one feature. Watch; Natural Selection Crash Course (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTftyFboC_M) Show Natural Selection Activity Natural selection is one of the basic mechanisms of evolution, along with mutation, migration, and genetic drift. Darwin’s grand idea of evolution by natural selection is relatively simple but often misunderstood. To find out how it works, imagine a population of beetles: There is variation in traits. For example, some beetles are green and some are brown. Color variation in these beetles There is differential reproduction . Since the environment can’t support unlimited population growth, not all individuals get to reproduce to their full potential. In this example, green beetles tend to get eaten by birds and survive to reproduce less often than brown beetles do. Differential reproduction There is heredity . The surviving brown beetles have brown baby beetles because this trait has a genetic basis. Heredity of the traits of the beetles who survive End result: The more advantageous trait, brown coloration, which allows the beetle to have more offspring, becomes more common in the population. If this process continues, eventually, all individuals in the population will be brown. Eventually, the advantageous trait dominates If you have variation, differential reproduction, and heredity, you will have evolution by natural selection as an outcome. It is as simple as that.
Assignment: Now apply these steps in a scenario that you create explaining the process of natural selection in one specific trait of one specific species..
Select a trait for a plant or animal. You do not have to know the truth about how this trait evolved. You are going to apply the steps of Natural selection and demonstrate how the trait might have evolved through natural selection. For ex. The animal is a gold fish and the trait is it’s color.
Step 1. There is variation in the trait, Color – of a species of fish some are gold colored and some are purple colored.
Step 2 Differential reproduction. – The habitat of the gold and purple fish changes. With more rains during a long period of rainy seasons the water the fish live in becomes full of sand and has a more golden hue to it. This makes the purple fish stand out more and they become more vulnerable to the threat of predators.
Step 3. Heredity – The gold colored fish survive at a greater rate and get to reproduce more. Over time the fish seem to have evolved from purple or gold varieties to just gold variety.