Bugs On The Run
By: Todd Woods and Izaiah Redd
These bowls are trpas we used to capture pollinators. They're called pan traps.
The purpose of this experiment is to find the variety of insects in different areas. We’re trying to find the biodiversity of bugs in different areas around chicago.
Description
Anyone Can Contribute
Someone can contribute to this project by placing pitfall traps in different areas to find out how the area of the trap and what is inside can affect what types of insects you will capture. They can also put out bottle traps and pan traps.
(Pan Traps)
Get a few different color bowls
place them side by side outside wherever you want to out them
put a drop of soap to break surface tension
fill the bowl with water
Method/Procedure
Other Method/Procedures
(Pit Fall Traps)
Dig 2 holes deep enough for the plastic cup to fit completely inside.
Fill one cup with one fifth of alcohol
Fill the other cup with one fifth of cat food
Add an empty cup to both cups that you have
Put both double cups in each of the holes
Place two clamps onto each cup
Place one tile on each clamp
Let it sit over night
Materials
(Pan Trap)
Different color bowls
water
soap
(Pit Fall Traps)
16 plastic cups
3 alcohol bottles
shovel
marker
8 tiles
2 eyes droppers
8 jars
files
bag of cat food
16 clamps
soil type guides’
insect guides
thromoeter
Project Summary
This project is all about bug biodiversity. Biodiversity is the variety of life in the world or in a particular habitat or ecosystem. Where is there are different bugs and why. Are bugs attracted to bait or do they just walk along the ground and end up trapped.
We are trying to learn if certain bugs are attracted to certain baits. Also where different types of bugs are found, if bugs prefer a certain type of environment or habitat.
You can help by setting up your own traps to see what you catch. Create a point on epicollect and contribute to our project. You can set up pitfall traps, with and/or without bait, pan traps, or bottle traps with or without bait.
Todd explaining what the pans traps are, how they work, and why we are using them.
Izaiah explaining where we put 4 different pitfall traps.
Todd explaining the traps by the pond and why we were takin them out.
This graph shows the average number of certain types of bugs found in different traps.
This is a butterfly we found in a white bowl pan trap.
Expected findings vs Actual Findings
We expexted to find that the bait in the pitfall traps would attract more, bigger, and better bugs, but we found that bugs were more likely to walk along the ground and wander into our regular, unbaited pitfall traps.