Post 3

1. Identify the organism or biological attribute that you plan to study.

I plan on looking at native and non-native/invasive plants along a park road in Lac du Bois Protected Area.

2. Use your field journal to document observations of your organism or

biological attribute along an environmental gradient. Choose at least three

locations along the gradient and observe and record any changes in the

distribution, abundance, or character of your object of study.

I have noticed that the percent cover of native species increases over non-native species the further from the park road.

Location 1: immediately beside the road.

Location 2: 10m from the road.

Location 3: 20m from the road.

3. Think about underlying processes that may cause any patterns that you have

observed. Postulate one hypothesis and make one formal prediction based on

that hypothesis. Your hypothesis may include the environmental gradient;

however, if you come up with a hypothesis that you want to pursue within

one part of the gradient or one site, that is acceptable as well.

The closer to the park road, the more human-caused disturbance and non-native species.

I hypothesize that the density of non-native species will decrease and the density of native species will increase the further away from the road.

4. Based on your hypothesis and prediction, list one potential response variable

and one potential explanatory variable and whether they would be

categorical or continuous. Use the experimental design tutorial to help you

with this.

Response variable: non-native species decrease, native species increase

Explanatory variable: distance away from park road.

Categorical: distance from road

Continuous: native/non native species density.