Sowbug Lab

We observed Sowbugs in multiple environments to determine which environment they preferred. The observational chamber was a rectangle box split equally in half. One side of this rectangle was filled with dry sand that had been heated for five minutes by a lamp, and the other side was filled with damp soil that did not receive the lamp heat. We placed each sowbug on the middle boarder of the cool, damp soil and the hot, dry sand. We each chose one sowbug to track, and made a record of its placement each minute for five minutes total. We repeated this process three times. After each repetition, we removed the sowbugs, and replaced them with new sowbugs to observe. After this observation, we shared, and recorded our results. The sowbugs spent

The independent variable was moisture. The dependent variable was the bug’s behavior on which soil the sowbug spent the most time in. The controlled variables were temperature, type of soil, and light intensity. We put a rectangular piece of cardboard vertically in the middle of an empty rectangular box. One side of the box was filled up with damp soil, and the other side was filled with dry soil. We filled the soil up to the level of the rectangular piece of cardboard, so that the cardboard wall would not deter the sowbug from crossing. We gathered 4 sowbugs, and placed them in a petri dish. We placed the sowbugs one by one on the border between both soils. Each of us tracked one sowbug, and diagrammed the movement. Every minute we would make a mark of where the sowbug had travelled. We continued this process for five minutes. We took the sowbugs out of the chamber, and placed them back in the petri dish. We repeated the experiment under the same conditions. Because we were short on time, we kept the same sowbugs for the second experiment

The sowbugs remained in the damp soil for 34 minutes, and the dry soil for a short 6 minutes (Table 1). The sowbugs remained in the damp soil 85% of the time, as opposed to 15% on the dry soil (Table 1). These results suggest that moisture was a causative agent in environment preference for the sowbugs (Table 1).

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION I hypothesized that sowbugs preferred damp soil, to dry, because moisture was the perceived causative agent. I observed that the sowbugs spent more time on the damp soil, rather than the dry soil (Table 1). The sowbugs spent 85% of their observed time on the damp soil side of the experimental chamber (Table 1). These results support my hypothesis, because they suggest that moisture of soil determines where sowbugs will prefer to spend their time (Table 1). The experiment was not perfect, and does not mean that moisture is the only determining factor of sowbug environment preference. To test if moisture is the only causative agent, we would need to make moisture a controlled variable. Moisture being controlled allows for us to test different types of soil, and temperature, and examine sowbug preference under those circumstances. To eliminate flaws in our experiment, we would repeat more experimental trials, as well as replace sowbugs with new ones each