Hobbies And Interests
Study of the Kangaroo Rat Habitat
Create a descriptive report regarding the study of the adaptations of the desert kangaroo rat. The descriptive report can comprise different sections, such as a description of the kangaroo rat, its habitat, adaptation, types of food, types of predators, how they protect themselves in the desert, population status, deserts in which they are found, how they communicate and how they reproduce. Illustrate the report on a poster board with pictures along with two to three sentences describing each section.
Map the Desert
Create a desert map to investigate the distribution of various types of animals found in a local desert or a desert of your choice. Take an 8x10 piece of plain white paper. Draw the structure of the location. If you are using a desert in a location far from your home, use a picture of the desert from a book or the Internet. Make several copies of your paper to use for each type of organism class. For instance, one copy would be for reptiles, birds, mammals, insects or plants. Observe or research the location. If observing a location, bring a desert animal and plant field guide for that area in order to identify different types of organisms. Bring binoculars to observe different types of birds. Remember to use caution when observing creatures in the desert. There are species of snakes and lizards that are poisonous. In addition, some plants, such as cacti, have sharp needles. Create a map on a large poster board and mark the distribution of animals. Feel free to use different colors and/or printed pictures.
Desert Heat
Conduct an experiment to illustrate how hot the desert can get due to the lack of trees and shading. Get a thermometer and two buckets of sand. Take the initial temperature of the buckets of sand at the surface. Place one of the buckets in a shady spot. Place the other bucket in direct sunlight. Let the buckets sit for one hour. Retake the temperature of the surface sand on each bucket.Take at least three measurements at different times during the day. Calculate the difference in temperature between the shady and direct sunlight bucket. Conduct a statistical measurement, such as a student's t-test, to see if there is a significant difference. Form a graph or chart to illustrate the differences to submit with your experiment.
How Cacti Store Water
Investigate how desert plants survive the desert habitat using the cactus plant. Place a wet paper towel on a baking sheet. Get another wet paper towel and roll it up. Clip the center with a paper clip and place the roll on the center of the baking sheet on top of the wet paper towel. Place a wet paper towel on top of a piece of wax paper. Roll up the wax paper and place on the baking sheet also. Leave the baking sheet to sit for one day. Observe the results. The laid out paper towel should be dry. The rolled up paper towel should be slightly damp. The paper towel inside the wax paper should be damp all over. The wax paper helped store the water in the paper towel. This is how a cactus stores water. The cactus has an outer waxy coat that protects the plant from water evaporation. In addition to this project, the student can obtain a cactus plant and cut a section of the plant to show the moist inner part of the plant. The student can prepare a poster presentation of this project with Introduction, Methods, Results and Discussion sections. Take pictures of the experiment and post on the board.