One of the Honey Badger’s most impressive weapons is not physical at all. The Honey Badger has developed incredible behavior variations when it comes to learning ability. This behavioral variation stems from the animals large brain to body size ratio. Their large brains have resulted in an incredible intelligence for sophisticated planning, tool use, and strategy. This provides the Honey Badger with an upper hand in the harsh and predator filled environment, which they live for both protecting themselves and foraging for food (Hughes, 2001). These variations for traits have equipped the badger with exceptional means of survival.
The second condition of natural selection evolution involves the Honey Badgers heritability of its complex traits (Phelan, 2010). Honey Badgers have been able to maintain their presence and dominant nature within their habitats as a result of successfully transmitting traits from parent to child. As can seen from Honey Badgers consistent size and cognitive abilities, the animal is capable of genetically passing it successful traits.
What had resulted over time are the Honey Badger’s current traits, which have largely determined the third condition of natural selection, reproductive success (Phelan, 2010). Honey Badgers are known to invest large amounts of parental care when raising their young. For 14 to 18 months, mothers take on the responsibilities of teaching their young how to hunt and survive within their habitat. The development of cubs is relatively slow. For the first two months of the Honey Badger’s life it is essentially blind. Mothers will keep their cub in burrows for a few days before picking up their child and carrying them to a new one. As the child develops, the mother will assist in t...
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...ning the entirety of animals back. This white fur helps the animal maintain a lower body temperature and reduce the amount of energy needed to maintain body temperature. This is essential for an animal that expends large amounts of energy throughout its life. The thick, tough, and loose skin is an imperative adaption when it comes to protection against larger predators. The fearless nature of the Honey Badger often results in confrontations with substantially larger animals. The evolved skin of the animal acts a mechanism to reduce the larger animals ability to grab the Honey Badger, which would inhibit its agility. Honey Badgers have been know to utilize this tool by charging predators with the back side of their necks. In doing this, the Honey Badger reduces the predator’s ability to grab it and also acts as a shield to protect other weapons the Honey Badger has.
There I was, standing face to face with the bobtailed lynx. It was looking right at me and licking its chops with delight. It seemed as if the beast was thinking "Lunch" on this cold, gray December day, but I wasn't worried about being attacked. The reason for this was the fact that this was a domestic lynx that just happened to be on the other side of a stout metal cage, so there was no chance of the lynx getting a hold of me.
...ightly to allow some air to pass underneath it. Snakes can regulate their temperature by placing different proportions of their bodies in sun or in shade. The variations are numerous, but the end result is the same ¡V some degree of temperature regulation in reptiles.
A prime example of natural selection is the development of antibiotic resistance in bacteria. In a given population of bacteria, there may be some that carry a short segment of DNA coding for a protein which is resistant to a given antibiotic. If that population now encounters that antibiotic, there is a major selective pressure - those bacteria that do not have the antibiotic resistance gene will die. The only ones that will survive will be the ones carrying that gene. Therefore, those remaining antibiotic resistant specimens will be able to reproduce, passing along the antibiotic ...
...his builds a relationship between the two causing the predator to consume its meat without looking away (Pollan 307). This causes that person to no want to know what they are eating because people are used to not knowing what they are eating.
Abiotic factors are the opposite of biotic factors. Abiotic factors are nonliving things that affect the wildlife. There are multiple different kinds of abiotic factors and here are some examples of abiotic factors that affect the Honey Badger. First, the amount of fresh water nearby. This is important because, like every other animal, the Honey Badger needs water to survive. Another abiotic factor would be the amount of beehives there are. Beehives are a big part of the Honey Badgers diet, that is why they are called the Honey Badger. Although Honey Badgers to sometimes eat honey, the main reason they like beehives is for the bee larvae. The amount of beehives in the area matters because the badgers need food. The third abiotic factor would be the climate in the Honey Badgers habitat. Honey Badgers are lucky because they are adaptable unlike some other animals. The Honey Badger likes to live in a dry habitat. The badgers live in hotter temperatures as well. Colder temperatures are not good for the Honey Badger therefore, the climate is an important abiotic
Charles Darwin founded the theory of evolution by natural selection, which according to this principle defines; biological characteristics enhance survival increase in frequency from generation to generation (Larsen et al. 22). These individuals are inclined to produce more sustainable offspring to pass their genes to, meaning that some individuals are more reproductively fruitful than others. Natural selection requires variation in a species, which can result by gene flow, mutation, or genetic drift & also involves environmental stresses such as climate change. These result as the evolutionary means of how certain traits can be selected. Eventually, traits that give individuals certain advantages, such as bipedalism in hominids, will be selected in great numbers & more individuals in a population will display these traits.
Predators of the meerkat include eagles and hawks, who can easily scoop up the tiny fellows, who weigh only two pounds. This danger requires at least one meerkat to be kept on “watch duty” at all times. This is quite the sacrifice, for the meerkat keeping watch is almost universally killed and eaten. However, the unfortunate meerkat will have already signaled an alarm to the rest of its manor before it is caught, thereby protecting its family and relatives and, in turn, fulfilling its only true purpose in life – passing on its genes.
However, the fragility of women and children has been overstated. Hunter-gatherer women are more than capable of performing the physical tasks of hunting. It also appears that infants brought along on a hunt experience little more danger than those taken on a plant gathering trip. Undoubtedly, there is increased risk, but it is either low enough that it does not affect infant mortality rates or the benefits are high enough to cancel out the danger. Simple biology does not fully account for the sexual division of labor, whether the issue is strength or
Out of an Ice Age emerged one of our most majestic creatures in the world the polar bear. From its brown bear ancestry, the predator evolved to be a master of a harsh and unwelcoming ice kingdom. Intelligent, adaptable and fierce, the polar bear learned how to survive in a place that offers few comforts to any creature. But now that very environment is in flux. And so is the polar bear’s fate (Nature). Polar Bears are very different from other bears. Polar bears are very large bears compared to Black bears. Polar bears weigh anywhere between 330-1700lbs and Black bears weigh anywhere between 150-600lbs. They have strong legs with large, flattened feet with some webbing between their toes that help with walking on ice and swimming. The wide paws prevent sea ice from breaking by distributing weight while walking. Their paws allow them to pull a 600 pound seal out of its breathing hole (Rosing, 20). The webbed feet results in making polar bears, unlike other bear species to be considered as marine mammals along with seals, sea lions, walruses, whales and dolphins (Polar Bear). According to Rosing Polar bears are excellent swimmers and have been known to swim up to six miles an hour and as far as 60 miles at a stretch. The bears paddle with their front feet and steer with their back feet. They often overheat. Sometimes they venture into the waters just to cool off. When a bear climbs on an ice floe, it shakes itself off because it is trying to prevent ice from forming on its fur (22-23). Because of climate change and hunting of polar bears are now becoming an endangered species which is affecting the food chain. We can fix this by going green, banning polar bear hunting and keep creating these new hybrid bears that are mixed with griz...
According to Darwin and his theory on evolution, organisms are presented with nature’s challenge of environmental change. Those that possess the characteristics of adapting to such challenges are successful in leaving their genes behind and ensuring that their lineage will continue. It is natural selection, where nature can perform tiny to mass sporadic experiments on its organisms, and the results can be interesting from extinction to significant changes within a species.
Natural selection today is considered one of the main processes of evolution, and also thought to be one of the reasons that there is such great diversity between all of the organisms on the earth today (6). The Origin of Species written by Charles Darwin helps explain that for natural selection to occur there must be optimal conditions satisfied; the units must vary, the units must be able to be passed on from generation to generation, and also there must be competition for resources (6). Since all organisms differ and have different traits and genes some organisms will have an advantage over the others and also tend to produce more offspring (6). Lewontin believed that natural selection could be applied to genes, organisms, populations,
The adaptations that the Axolotl’s have strongly increase their chances of survival and their overall fitness. The Axolotl’s cone shaped teeth allows them to catch food so that they may easily do their “vacuum” action to eat food. This favorable trait grips whatever food they are going to eat, so th...
Three of which can be a counterfactual account, a manipulability account, and a controlled experiment account (Millstein, 2006), but only the first two will be reviewed. For each of the three cases heritable differences in physical characteristics and differences in reproductive success can be seen (Millstein, 2006). With the counterfactual account, the heritable difference can be explained by saying that the differences in reproductive success do not occur (Millstein, 2006). Natural selection favors the counterfactuals because, if there were no heritable differences in characteristics among organisms in the population, then there would be no differences in reproductive success (Millstein, 2006). This would mean that natural selection had nothing to favor and all organisms would have the same genotype (Millstein, 2006). Referring to the manipulability account, if scientists would change the heritable differences in physical characteristics of the organism in a population, there would be a visible change of their reproductive success (Millstein, 2006). For example, in a population of beetles with varying abilities to withstand different temperatures, a new beetle genotype is introduced that can withstand a greater range of temperatures, and we would expect that the relative reproductive success of the other genotypes would decrease (Millstein,
This chapter discusses The Evolutionary Perspective, Genetic Foundations, reproductive Challenges, and Heredity-Environment Interactions. Natural selection is the process by which those individuals of a species that are best adapted survive and reproduce. Darwin proposed that natural selection fuels evolution. In evolutionary theory, adaptive behavior is behavior that promotes the organism’s survival in a natural habitat. Evolutionary psychology holds that adaptation, reproduction, and “survival of the fittest” are important in shaping behavior. Ideas proposed by evolutionary developmental psychology include the view that an extended childhood period is needed to develop a large brain and learn the complexity of human social communities. According to Baltes, the benefits resulting from evolutionary selection decrease with age mainly because of a decline in reproductive fitness. At the same time, cultural needs increase. Like other theoretical approaches to development, evolutionary psychology has limitations. Bandura rejects “one-sided evolutionism” and argues for a bidirectional lin...
Natural selection is based on the concept “survival of the fittest” where the most favourable individual best suited in the environment survive and pass on their genes for the next generation. Those individual who are less suited to the environment will die.