WHY DID WE MONITOR THE POPULATION?

We monitored the our insects population incase we had some escape, die, or reproduce. Although half way through our assignment we realised that we might have counted wrong the first day, as every count after that had the same amount of insects.

HOW DID WE MEASURE THE INSECTS POPULATION?

We measured the population of the insects by counting all the insects, in total of 21, originally, then realised we only had 20. For the "Capture recapture method", we took our 10 of the stick insects and used a permanent marker and marked a dot on the back of the 10 insects. In doing so we then placed the insects back into the enclosure. To measure this we have to randomly pick out a handful of 10 insects and check out of the 10, how many of them were marked. We then have to record how many of them were marked (recaptured).

The population is then recorded through this formula: Abundance = (Number captured x Number recaptured) DIVIDED by (Number marked in recapture)

Down below you can see a table that shows our current calculation.

WHY USE THE 'CAPTURE RECAPTURE METHOD'?

We chose to use the 'Capture/Recapture method' as it is easier then looking for and then taking out all 20 insects, the same reasoning as to why we only measure and weigh 5 insects for the growth. This method is more efficient, faster and accurate to measure and use for the population of our insect.