Ethogram - Custom Essay

This assignment is an exercise to help you get more experience observing animal behavior and reporting your observations.  The requirement is to select an animal that can be observed conveniently in the field (city park, nature preserve, etc.) or in captivity (zoo, aquarium, etc.) and to observe its behavior for a minimum of two hours.  Written notes should be taken describing the behavior you observe.  For state behaviors such as feeding or locomoting you should carefully note the length of time for the behavior.  For events, you should note the time at which the event occurred, such as “the duck flew into the water 15 minutes into the observation”.   Your observation should start with an ad libitum observation of all the animals in the group for approximately 30 minutes.  This will familiarize you with the species and common behaviors.  This will also allow you to define specific behaviors, such as feeding or locomoting.  After that, you should choose between using a focal sampling or a scan sampling method for your observation.  In your report state which method you chose.  You will write a report of your observations (approximately 4-6 pages).

Materials Needed:

Behavioral notes may be recorded in any convenient notebook.  Use a pencil or waterproof pen as a writing implement.  Although not required, you may want to use binoculars to view your subject animal.

Selection of Animal(s):

In the general area, there are a number of animals that could serve as subjects.  Parks generally have an abundance of gray squirrels (Sciurus carolinenis), common birds, such as pigeons (more correctly referred to as rock doves, Columba livia), and even cottontail rabbits (Sylvilagus floridanus) that are found on campus.  You may also find mallard docks (Anas platyrhyncos) and Canada geese (Branta canadensis) in the ponds.

Captive animals also can be observed for this assignment, provided they are housed in adequate quarters to permit a variety of behaviors.  Watching a mouse or rat in a small cage is not appropriate for this assignment.  Watching your dog or cat also is not a good choice – household pets spend much of their time either sleeping or interacting with humans, and the purpose of this assignment is to observe more natural behavior without human interference.  However, fish and other aquarium species make excellent subjects for observation, especially if the aquarium contains different substrates and vegetation (i.e., not just an empty fishbowl).  If you are watching an aquarium with mixed species, select only one subject for observation.  Also, feel free to observe an animal at one of the many local zoos (Santa Ana Zoo, San Diego Zoo, Los Angeles Zoo, San Diego Zoo Safari Park).  When selecting a subject for observation at a zoo, look for animals that are likely to be awake, active and watchable, and are housed in cages that are large and complex enough to permit a variety of behaviors.

Report:

During a minimum of a 120 minute period (2 hours) of observing your animal subject, you should expect to record somewhere between 5 and 20 individual descriptions of behavior. You do not need to turn in your original notes. 

1.  Introduction (10 points)

Describe the species you observed.  You will likely need to do some outside research to properly identify the animal and gather this information.  Include information about their natural habitat, diet, average size, and any other information you think is relevant.

2. Methods (5 points)

Describe the conditions for your observation. Describe the location, date, and time of day.  Include a description of the area, noting prominent features in the environment, vegetation, whether other people or animals are present, and the weather conditions.

3. Behavior Description (15 points)

Name and describe the different behaviors you observed.  Descriptions should include a fair amount of detail, and use the three description types discussed in class:  Structure, consequences, and spatial relation.  You can divide the behaviors into meaningful subgroups like “locomotion”, “feeding”, “mating”, or “social behavior.”  Obviously, this will depend on greatly on the types of behavior you observe.  It might also be useful to make sketches or take photos of specific behaviors to include as part of the ethogram.

4. Data (10 points)

Now that you have described the behaviors you observed, you should present when and how often these behavior occurred. This may be similar to your field notes, listing the behaviors, and the duration (for state behaviors) or time (for events) of each behavior.  You should include descriptive statistics.  For example, what percentage of the observation time did the duck spend foraging?  How many times during the observation did the duck flap its wings?  A table or graph may be helpful for presenting these descriptive statistics.

5. Discussion (10 points)

Based on your observations, makes some conclusions about your observation.  What behaviors were most common?  What behaviors were quite rare?  How do you think weather, season, or time of day may have played a role in the types of behaviors observed?  Did you have difficulty defining or interpreting any observed behaviors?  You should suggest possible experiments or further studies based on your observations.

Notes on: Describing Behavior

¢  Structure: What does the behavior look (or sound, or smell) like? How is the animal positioned and what motions is it going through?

¢  Consequences: What effect does the behavior have? Includes effects on the animal subject, another animal, or the environment.

¢  Spatial Relation: Where or with whom is the subject behaving? Rather than be concerned with what the animal is doing, the focus is on the environment, orientation or social context.