Week 4 - Pan Trap Experiment

The experiment was conducted at York University on October 3rd, 2014 in the Danby Woods woodlot and the adjacent grassland. The purpose of this experiment was to become comfortable with animal sampling methods used in Ecology studies. Two experiments were conducted. The first experiment was conducted in the woodlot. Ten pan traps (bowls), of different colours (blue, yellow, and white), were placed at varying distances (0m, 0.5m, 1m), from the landmark (flowering shrub). The bowls were filled halfway with soapy water and left for 60 minutes. After, the bowls were inspected. The number of insects were counted, as well as the number of RTUs. General classifications of the insects were also recorded. The purpose of this experiment was to determine if distance from a flowering shrub, as well as bowl colour, had any effect on the number, diversity of insects captured in the cup. A similar experiment was conducted in the Danby Woods. 10 pan traps of different colours (blue, white, and yellow), were placed at varying distaces from the landmark (a large tree). The experiment followed similiar procedures as the grasslands experiment, and data was collected in the same way. This data was collected in collaboration with other researchers Elron, Simmy, and Laiba.