I’m at the Zoo, What do I do? Name:

Partner:

Date:

Introduction

Historically, zoos had the purpose of bring exotic animals to the people and providing entertainment. Over the last few decades, zoos have begun to focus on conservation and education rather than entertainment. The Detroit Zoo mission is to protect many different species from Michigan, the United States, and even the world. The Detroit Zoo has organisms from most of the corners of the world and does a good job of mimicking their natural habitat. Your goal today is to make observations of animal structure, behavior, and function in order to construct a cladogram and describe the evolutionary relationships between the organisms you have chosen. A word of warning before you begin – the more diverse your selection of animals, the easier your assignment will be. In other words, don’t choose five types of bears! (You’ll understand why in a bit).

Materials
Clipboard Handout Data sheets/log Camera or Money

Pen/Pencil Notebook Zoo Map

Procedure

Pre-Zoo

1. Familiarize yourself with the data sheets/log and zoo map before our field trip to the zoo.

2. Map out your plan of attack for the zoo. Which animals are you going to visit? What animals do you think you’d like to choose?

At the Zoo

3. Choose anywhere between 8 and 10 animals that you are going to visit today. You may work by yourself or with one other person – NO GROUPS OF THREE OR MORE!!

4. For each animal you visit, complete the following.

a. Fill out a data sheet/log for that animal

b. Take a picture of the animal, or buy a postcard/picture from any of the souvenir stands.

c. Make sure to talk to people who work at the zoo to help you to collect your data.

5. Enjoy yourself if you have any extra time at the zoo.

Post Zoo

6. Choose at least 5 of your animals you collected data on to construct a cladogram based on physical characteristics.

7. Continue your research in the library in order to gather information that could not be gained at the zoo.

8. Create a poster of your cladogram that depicts the characteristics the define the branches. Make sure to include your outgroup!

9. Write a two to three page paper detailing the evolutionary events that helped to create your cladogram and describe why these events are significant in biology.

**More specific details about your poster and paper will be given the day after we go to the zoo.