In the news… Cammy: A New Canadian Lake Monster? I always like to start my discussions with something interetsing in the science news and this week I found an article about a sighting of a lake monster in Canada…you can use this to segue into ecosystems and why they are important. I used this example to highlight how something like a lake monster can bring interest to an ecosystem which directly leads to people wanting to conserve them (and the biodiversity found within them). Tangential and could be easily discarded without harming powerpoint

Ecosystem Health And Habitat Alteration What is an ecosystem? What makes up an ecosystem? Can you name some ecosystems? How do we place value on an ecosystem? Introduce the concepts. Ask students what ecology is, what an ecosystem is. Ask them to idenitfy different ecosystems. What are their impression (this will help you idenitfy deficiencies in their knowledge. Discuss how we place “value” on ecosystems…is this right or wrong? What is so important about different ecosystems…stress the importance of different ecosystems as homes to very different species all adapted to their particular environment…ask students to make a prediction regarding ecosystem health and biodiversity…as ecosystems around the world are altered what does this do to biodiversity. Highlight the positive correlation between habitat degredation and species loss. Why do your students think this is important?

Ecosystem Health And Habitat Alteration Discuss the impacts of habitat alteration on ecosystems. What are the consequences of altering/destroying habitats/ecosystems. You want to lead the students to the conclusion that as you destroy or alter natural landscapes you reduce the ability of the lansdcape to house as many different species (i.e. you lose biodiversity) Bottom figure. amazon deforestation, top figure. Erosion of valuable soil nutrients (and soil) to the ocean because of deforestation of Amazon rainforest. Use these examples to get kids brains working. What do these things have in common (the destruction of rainforest and the incredible loss of nutrients)? They both decrease the ability of the forest to survive and result in decreased ability of species who depend on it to surivive (LOSS OF BIODIVERSITY)

BIODIVERSITY A Measure of Ecosystem Health Today and Tomrrow, you will… 1) measure biodiversity in two locations -spend 15 minutes collecting insects from both locations -with Instructor’s help, identify insects down to order 2) measure ecosystem “health” by collecting the following data for each location: -estimating “arthropod biomass” or abundance (total # animals) -estimating “order richness” (total orders found) Briefly outline the goal of this lesson, “to identify the causal relationship between habitat degredation/alteration and the loss of biodiversity.