by
Cheryl Heinz, Dept. of Biological Sciences, Benedictine University, and Eric Ribbens, Dept. of Biological Sciences, Western Illinois University
Implications
Terrestrial species on these islands wont have many relatives nearby.
Neighboring islands will have close relatives
but new terrestrial species wont arrive on these islands from the South American mainland very often. most of the island species have had plenty of time to differentiate from their nearest living relatives.
Another way of saying this is that there is very little gene flow between the islands and the mainland.
Charles Darwin
Darwin explored these islands from April through October 1835.
Entire voyage of The Beagle: Dec 1831 - Oct 1836
When and where he started thinking about what was to become his theory of evolution by natural selection. He did not publish his thoughts until the publication of The Origin of Species in 1859.
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Natural selection is just such a mechanism, and this is what Darwin contributed.
Galapagos Endemics
The Galapagos today is an amazing place.
Animals live there that are found nowhere else on earth.
This makes them endemic Perhaps the most famous of the endemic birds are the finches, of which there are 13 different species
The islands are a natural laboratory, and one in which evolution can be observed.
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Endemics
Among the kinds of animals found here and nowhere else: 1 penguin species 1 giant tortoise species 1 marine iguana species 7 species of lava lizard 14 species of sea cucumber 1 species of sea lion 1 species of hawk several species each of mockingbirds, doves, owls, flycatchers, and yellow warblers
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The Finches
The 13 finch species include:
6 species of ground finches 3 species of tree finches 1 woodpecker finch 1 vegetarian finch 1 mangrove finch 1 Coco Island finch
A warbler finch that looks more like a warbler than a finch (one of the tree finches). The woodpecker finch actually uses cactus spines to dig grubs out of branches!
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Graph showing the distribution of beak depths for medium ground finches in Year 1
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In a normal year, 130mm of rain would fall. In Year 1, 137mm of rain fell.
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In the drought, the plants conserved their resources and did not produce new seeds. Similarly, the finches did not mate and did not produce eggs in Year 2
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Seeds
A variety of seeds are produced on the island.
Finches prefer the softest seeds, which are the easiest to open.
The seeds above are seeds of a plant called Caltrop, in the genus Tribulus.
These are among the hardest to eat. It takes a medium ground finch with a beak at least 11mm long to open one. Ground finches with beaks that are 10.5mm long or less havent even been seen trying to eat them.
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Prediction?
What do you think will happen to the size of the finch population between Years 1 and 3? (Remember, Year 2 is a drought year.)
Sketch a rough graph of your prediction
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CQ5: What do you think a graph of population size would look like for Year 1 to Year 3?
A:
Time
B:
Time
C:
Time
D:
Time
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Year 3 Data
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CQ6: What was the average beak depth in 1978? (Remember that the average beak depth in 1976 was 9.5 mm.)
A: Just under 7mm B: About 8mm C: About 9mm D: Just under 10mm E: Just under 11mm
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Evolution is:
A change in the frequency of an allele, such as an allele for beak depth, is the basic definition of evolution.
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Surprises?
Two things surprised the Grants:
1. Evolution could occur quickly enough to observe within a few field seasons.
Darwin believed that we did not have a long enough lifespan to observe evolution. A single weather event can cause evolution, if there are traits that affect survival and if there is variation in those traits.
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Surprises?
2. Evolution can occur at very small scales. The Grants measurements were very careful.
The birds werent used to humans, and so were easy to catch and measure They couldnt see a difference in even 1mm between two finches, but their measurements could And due to those measurements, they could find that 0.5mm was enough to make a difference between survival and death in a drought year
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Heritability
Its important to note that beak size and shape is heritable in these finches.
A bird with a large, deep beak will have offspring with large and deep beaks.
Natural selection can occur without heritability, but evolution by natural selection cannot!
(think about that for a minute)
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CQ9: If beak depth increased during the drought, primarily due to selective mortality, can we really say that this natural selection was driven by environment favoring the survival of birds with deeper beaks? A: No. Beak depth changed due to birds dying, not to birds surviving. B: Yes. Birds with deeper beaks survived at a higher rate than birds with shallower beaks.
C: Im really confused.
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