...Organism Physiology Paper BIO101 April 15, 2014 Organism Physiology Paper The Sea Lion is the Organism that I want to discuss in this paper today. It has a highly controversial on weather this animal was a land walker only and when it actually acclimated to water, and why. After spending numerous hours researching this organism, it is still unclear to me when and why this animal changed its environment to include water. It is believed by many in the scientific world that the Sea Lion was a land dweller and became a water creature due to not have enough food in its land environment. “It's long been assumed that marine mammals in the pinniped group – seals, sea lions and walrus – evolved from a land-based common ancestor, but until now, no definitive fossil evidence had materialized” (Harmon, 2009). The animal would have had four legs that would have become webbed after its transfer to water. Its adaptation would have allowed it to survive under water for longer periods as well. The creature would have more than likely looked like the picture below if this is an accurate depiction of its ancestry. [pic] Its evolution would have included, being able to walk on land with paws that grip the earth, breathe air always to changing itself allowing it to breathe underwater and swim like a fish. Its paws slowly formed to fin like water movers however it still...
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...Paragraph 1: Misconceptions about Natural Selection One of the misconceptions about natural selection is that humans can’t negatively impact ecosystems, because species will just evolve what they need to survive. This is, perhaps, based on another misconception that natural selection can predict and supply what a species needs. This however is not true. Natural selection happens non-randomly in some individuals in a species who possess adaptive phenotypic traits that have a higher net reproductive success than individuals without these traits (Larry L Mai, 2005, 371). Natural selection can only occur for those adaptive traits that possess heritability. This means that if a population does not possess these genetic variations, evolution in response to environmental changes brought on by humans will not occur in the species. For example, climate changes i.e. global warming has had and is still having quite an adverse effect on the Arctic, causing the sea ice to decline drastically and thus having a negative impact on the ecosystem. Polar bears, whose main source of diet are seals, depend on the sea ice for their hunting methods, which is stalk seals at their breathing holes in the ice. Another animal negatively impacted by the disappearing sea ice are the Walrus. Walrus depend on floating pieces of sea ice to haul themselves out of the water. However, as the sea ice disappears some Walruses and walrus pups drown at sea. If the Polar Bear’s and Walrus’s lack the necessary genetic...
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...It is well known that the Arctic and Antarctic regions have harsh, cold winds, low temperatures and heavy snow fall, however, these environments are home to many species of birds and mammals which successfully survive and reproduce in spite of these extreme, seemingly uninhabitable conditions. They need special adaptations to help them survive and have many difficult obstacles to overcome including regulating and maintaining body temperature, coping with predation and with scarcity in food. The arctic fox (Vulpes lagopus) is native to the Arctic regions of the Northern Hemisphere and inhabits the arctic tundra environments of Eurasia, North America and the alpine tundra of Fennoscandia. Within the worldwide population there are several hundred thousand individuals (The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, 2013). Populations vary in response to numbers in small mammals. They hunt lemmings, which are their main prey (Strand et. al., 1997), small birds and their eggs and also scavenge carcases in times where food is scarce (Hiruki and Stirling, 1989). Arctic foxes are relatively small mammals at around 3-8 kg. They have small ears, short noses, fur covering the pads on its feet. Its brush like tail aids in keeping its balance but is mostly used for insulation. During the winter arctic foxes have a thick white fur which provides camouflage against the white snowy expanse of the tundra and protection against the harsh environments, in the summer its coat becomes thinner and changes...
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...Polar Bears, the largest members of the Ursidae family, are bears that have transparent fur, which keeps them warm in icy and cold environments. They have large bodies, where male polar bears can weigh anywhere from 700 to 1,000 pounds, and female polar bears weighing anywhere from 300 to 700 pounds. While standing upright, they typically measure around 10 feet tall. Lengthwise, they measure around 7 to 8 feet long. The average lifespan of most polar bears ranges from 20 to 25 years. While they do appear as harmless majestic creatures, they are actually some of the most vicious hunters and carnivores out there. Furthermore, Polar bears have strong large legs with some webbing on their feet, making it easier to walk on ice as well as swim. Their wide paws help distribute their weight while walking, which prevents them from breaking any ice they walk on. Contrary to popular belief, polar bears are not white. Their skin is actually black, and they have a layer of fat that can be up to 5 inches thick to keep them warm. Their fur is actually transparent, and appears white due to the reflection of the snow and icy environments they live in. Polar bears can have unpredictable behaviors, as they spend most of their time alone, except when mating. However, when it comes to communicating with one another, polar bears wag their heads to one another, signifying playful behavior. Also, when a polar bear growls or roars loudly, that is usually a sign of anger. Moreover, Polar bears genus is...
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...Imagine you are a polar bear, and you want to get to shore, but you can't because it's too long of a swim, because the ice caps at the shore have melted and the ice caps you are on our floating further and further away becauses of greenhouse gas effects on the environment. Therefore you can't get home, you can't get food, and you can't survive. The polar bear was added to the endangered animal list in 2008 because of multiple causes, most are from impacts caused by greenhouse gases. Greenhouse gases in Alaska and Northern Canada have three major Impacts on polar bears and their ecosystem: Greenhouse gases cause pollution in the ecosystem. They cause climate change in the ecosystem, melting the ice caps the polar bears live on, and lastly the greenhouse gases cause shorter hunting seasons, less food for the polar bears, and bad body conditions for polar bears, causing the polar bear population to go down. Greenhouse gases make the ecosystems atmosphere very polluted and cause many bad effects. Steven Amstrup a senior researcher with the US Geological Survey and the Montana-based conservation group Polar Bears International, says "Indeed, if greenhouse gas emissions were mitigated, that substantially more sea ice could be retained,"(J Berman 2010). Greenhouse gases spread across the polar bears habitat causing a variety of problems, in Alaska and Northern Canada. The gases spread along the coasts and are going over the ocean causing problems for fish and killing fish, which...
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...ARCTIC VOL. 59, NO. 3 (SEPTEMBER 2006) P. 261 – 275 Possible Effects of Climate Warming on Selected Populations of Polar Bears (Ursus maritimus) in the Canadian Arctic IAN STIRLING1 and CLAIRE L. PARKINSON2 (Received 10 November 2005; accepted in revised form 25 January 2006) ABSTRACT. Polar bears depend on sea ice for survival. Climate warming in the Arctic has caused significant declines in total cover and thickness of sea ice in the polar basin and progressively earlier breakup in some areas. Inuit hunters in the areas of four polar bear populations in the eastern Canadian Arctic (including Western Hudson Bay) have reported seeing more bears near settlements during the open-water period in recent years. In a fifth ecologically similar population, no changes have yet been reported by Inuit hunters. These observations, interpreted as evidence of increasing population size, have resulted in increases in hunting quotas. However, long-term data on the population size and body condition of polar bears in Western Hudson Bay, as well as population and harvest data from Baffin Bay, make it clear that those two populations at least are more likely to be declining, not increasing. While the ecological details vary in the regions occupied by the five different populations discussed in this paper, analysis of passive-microwave satellite imagery beginning in the late 1970s indicates that the sea ice is breaking up at progressively earlier dates, so that bears must fast for longer...
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...- employees wear hearing protection - bandaids with metal in them so that they can be picked up just in case they fall in to the food - employees with bandaids must wear a glove over them - lift trucks are used on the same floor as people are walking. - There are yellow and blue paths for people and machines to travel on in order to keep safe - Mirrors are in place to help people see around corners - floors are wet and slippery - SAP computer system that is a total business managements computer system that manages everything form when an order is placed from a customer to when it is shipped out from the distributer and everything in between including operations - When a new product is launched the information must be put into SAP - SAP manages things like collecting the costs related to each specific product based on inputs put in by employees. When a case of finished product comes off the line, the system goes through the build materials and takes them out of inventory that were used to make that case of finished products - system is very arbritary everything has to be exact or else it wont work efficiently. - started operations in 1931. since its been created its been expanded to 550000 sqft. added on to about 4 times. - carrots are received in bulk and put into metal bins. they are dumped in to peeling lines, get washed. They are then washed again and peeled and then scrubbed to remove the loose peel. - the water used to cool down the hot cans is 80-90 degrees...
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...SPECIES- Ursus Maritimus, Polar Bear, lord of the Arctic. Lives in an area of five million square miles of snow and ice. From Siberia to Alaska and across Canada, Greenland and the Islands north of Norway, he is the master of all living things except man. It lives in the brutal cold, ice, and snow. The temperature can plunge down frequently to -40 degrees and sometimes even lower but that does not bother the polar bear because of its color-less skin and layer of insulation fat. Its range extending around the northern polar region. Necessities of Life-The polar bear eats mostly seals which he has to hunt. His trick is to wait by a breathing in the ice and when a seal comes up by that breathing hole, he grabs it so fast it knocks it unconscious and then he eats it. Other pray is a walrus calf or a musk ox stuck in snow, birds, eggs, fish, and dead whales. And sometimes in the summer it eats berries and grass. The polar bear has no water to drink so it only eats the skin and blubber, avoiding the meat. So by eating the blubber and leaving the meat the male bear is helping keep his body in balance with the surrounding environment. The bear would usually stay in a den or bury it self in the snow to avoid the suns ultra violent rays. Usually the pregnant female polar bear stays in the den.Food Chain-The polar bear finds its way on the top of its food chain. No predator on earth approaches the bear in size. The polar bear towers over everything else in his food chain. The...
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...Scientists have studied the feeding habits of the extinct Cave Bear. Based on the isotope composition in the collagen of the bears' bones, they were able to show that the large mammals subsisted on a purely vegan diet. The team proposes that it was this inflexible diet that led to the Cave Bear's extinction approximately 25,000 years ago. In the study, recently published in the scientific publication Journal of Quaternary Science, the international team proposes that it was this inflexible diet that led to the Cave Bear's extinction approximately 25,000 years ago. So the cave bears went on a inflexible diet... Cave bears mostly lived in Europe during the most recent glacial period, approximately 400,000 years ago, until they became extinct...
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...Hunted almost to extinction in the 1960s Most seals are at home in frigid waters, but the Hawaiian monk seal is a rare tropical exception(“Hawaiian Monk Seal” National Geographic). The Hawaiian Monk Seal population was observed to decline from 1,520 total individuals in 1983 to 1,209 in 2011(“Neomonachus schauinslandi”IUCN red list). They are amazing swimmers which allows them to move around very easily in the water(“Hawaiian monk seal” Seals-World). Now that you see how significant this attempt is, please use your role in the Hawaiian government to help protect this animal since they are the only seal native to Hawaii, it is one of two remaining ancient seals, and without it, the Hawaiian ecosystem could be diminished for future generations of marine animals, although it may not affect those on land. Until we save the Hawaiian monk seal, Hawaii might not have a native seal. Hawaiian Monk Seals are the only seals native to Hawaii. “Like the other species of warm-water monk seals, the Mediterranean, and Caribbean monk seals, the Hawaiian monk seal has a tenuous grasp on survival. The Caribbean monk seal, in fact, is believed to have been extinct since the 1970s" (National Geographic 3). This demonstrates that the two types of monk seals left are the Hawaiian and Caribbean. ”Hawaiian monk seals are listed as endangered on the U.S. endangered species list and the State of Hawaii’s endangered species list and are also protected by the Marine Mammal Protection Act”(Cuffie 3)....
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...The topic of my paper is the cruel seal hunt that is going on in canada, and how the seals are brutally killed as soon as 2 days when their fluffy white coats malt off of them and they have the coat and they are killed slowly. The seals also cannot reproduce because they are killed so young. The seals are being hunted until extincion hounders of thousands of seals are killed each year. The skin of the seals are cut off and thrown back into the water. The seals don't have a sporting chance to live because they are killed so early in life and they are not strong swimmers so if they enter the water they just drown. The seals do not have a sporting chance to grow and get away from hunters. The seals are killed early and they are unable to swim....
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.... State the administrative agency which controls the regulation. Explain why this agency and your proposed regulation interest you (briefly). Will this proposed regulation affect you or the business in which you are working? If so, how? Submit a copy of the proposed regulation along with your responses to these five questions. The proposed regulation can be submitted as either a separate Word document (.doc) or Adobe file (.pdf). This means you will submit two attachments to the Week 2 Dropbox: (1) a Word doc with the questions and your answers and (2) a copy of the proposed regulation you used for this assignment. (10 points) The administrative agency that controls this regulation is the Fish and Wildlife Service, which is under the Department of the Interior. This proposed regulation interests me because it affects wildlife that have done nothing but existed for many years and humans have infringed on their land. I have issues with companies who think that they can go in, do what this wish and not have to be held accountable for what they have done or for what they might do. 2. Describe the proposal/change. (10 points) The proposed regulation would authorize the incidental, but not intentional, taking of polar bears, and walruses in the Beaufort Sea and coast line of north Alaska while looking for and drilling of gas and oil. 3. Write the public comment which you would submit to this proposal. If the proposed regulation deadline has already passed, write the comment you...
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...Figure F-1 http://www.exploringnature.org/graphics/mammals/bear_polar_bw_diagram150.jpg Figure F-2 http://forums.bowsite.com/tf/pics/00small78686148.JPG Some animals are noted for their physiology to live in certain conditions. One of those animals is the polar bear who lives in the extreme cold temperatures of the Arctic. In figure F-1, shown are several features which helps the Polar bear adapt to environment minus a few which will be noted later. These amazing powerful creatures are one of the few mammals which have adapted to its marine environment. As seen in figure F-1, the polar bear has large feet. “To help protect their feet, there are pads on the bottom of them. They are designed to give them plenty of traction for walking on the slippery ice” (2011). The ground in the arctic is permanently frozen. In order for the polar bear to be able to walk on the ground and keep warm, they have these large padded feet to assist them in their living environment. These padded feet are also equipped with large claws which are used in hunting their prey. The polar bear's Latin name, ursus maritimus, means “sea bear” (2011). This animal is one of the few mammals which depends on it s marine environment for survival. As shown above in Figure F-1, the polar bear has short legs and large feet to allow them to propel through the water quickly. Because of these physiological features, the polar bear is able to catch its prey quickly and efficiently. Another interesting...
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...Adaptive features of a polar bear 1. Long, stiff hair between pads of bear's feet: - Protect bear's feet from the cold - Provides traction on the ice - Help the bear swim in cold, icy water - Also helps to keep bear from slipping on the slippery ice - Hair usually shakes free any water or ice formed after swimming 2. Hollow fur - Traps air inside, thus making the bear buoyant in water - The layer of air provides insulation between their warm bodies and the cold Arctic air and water - Insulation provided is lost when fur is covered with oil 3. Small and rounded ears - Prevents water from entering the bear's ears and freezing their eardrums, u see, big ears, more water! - Helps conserve body warmth in sub-zero temperatures 4. Digging of dens several metres deep - Shelter from winds that sweep over the ice in strong gusts, unbroken by trees or vegetation 5. Light colour of bear's fur provides camouflage against the ice - When hunting, bear covers black nose with its paws to hide it 6. Strong swimmers - Polar bears can travel up to a speed of 10 kph - Have been known to swim continuously for 100 km - Enables them to catch prey 7. Thick layer of fat (blubber) under skin - Up to 11 cm thick - Insulates bear from arctic cold - Overheating might occur ...
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...The Survival And Cubbing of Polar Bears The survival and cubbing of Polar bears is rapidly getting affected due to climate change and Global Warming, as says the Wildlife technical report(Michelle Allsopp, 2012). The healthy breeding of Polar bears relies greatly on the Arctic’s ice covered waters and cultivate Arctic Wildlife, as well. Polar bears are the most precious habitats of Arctic wildlife, Not only because they are limited in numbers but also on the grounds that the specie have now endangered for conservation. According to authentic information(Michelle Allsopp, 2012), a female Polar bears can only give birth to 1 to 3 cubs with in life time. Also, the mortality rate of infant cubs exceed from 70 %. Hence, there are less chances that the individuals of the Polar bears can be replaced by new generations. Furthermore, the other factors of climate change and global warming have intensified the threat to the species conservation due to climate changes in Arctic Wildlife. The projected claim can be justified with supporting observations presented below for reference. * Comprised survival rates of sub adult due to poor nutritions resulted from the sea ice breakup. * Inefficient reproduction cycle due to early spring ice breakup. * Deprived access to prey for sufficient nutrition due to aggravated rate of melting ice. The prime effect of global warming on Arctic resulted in added and unnecessary sea ice breakup. The rapid quantity of melting sea ice has completely altered...
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