Elyse Stevens pd 5 good

Long Tailed Weasel

Elyse Stevens

Biology II Honors

Pd 5

Niche of the Long Tailed Weasel(Mustela Frenata)

• They are found in temperate and tropical climates of North and Central America

• They usually live in crop fields or small wooded areas, and are also found in suburban areas. They are not found in deserts or thick forests

• Their burrows are in logs, rock piles, and under barns• Long tailed weasels manage the rabbit and rodent

population• They are predators of voles and mice as well• They hunt their prey by picking up on a scent or noise,

then hunt them. They kill their prey with a bite at the base of the neck

Factors that affect the Birth Rate of a Long Tailed Weasel

• Mating occurs in the mid summer months• The egg doesn’t begin to develop until March. The

total gestation period is then around 280 days• The size of the litter varies but is usually around 6

young weasels• The young weasels usually weigh about 3 grams• They learn how to kill prey from their mother and by

the age of 55 days the young weasels can kill prey by themselves

• Female weasels mate in their 1st summer, while males wait until the following spring

Factors that affect the Death Rate of a Long Tailed Weasel

• Many long tailed weasels die before they reach the age of 1

• It is unknown the exact lifespan of the long tailed weasel, but once they reach adulthood they are said to live numerous years

• Weasels are very aggressive and will fight animals much bigger than themselves. They are very at risk to predation when they are young

• They usually prey on ground squirrels, pocket gophers, rats, and small rabbits; also insects make up a small part of their diet

Food Chain of a Long Tailed Weasel

Producer

Autotroph

Primary Consumer

Herbivore

Secondary Consumer

Carnivore

Tertiary Consumer

Carnivore

Seeds Rabbit Snake Weasel

Food Web of a Long Tailed Weasel

Producer

Carnivore

Carnivore

Decomposer

Herbivore

Carnivore

Carnivore Omnivore Carnivore

Omnivore

Population Sampling Techniques

• The way that you can do population sampling is by banding animals. People from the game commission band animals with bands that have trackers in them and then they can find them later and see how many of them survived.

•They use bands to track the weasels and later on down the road they find the weasels and they estimate how many of them survived

Stream Quality Data & Analysis

•The organisms that we found at Powdermill stream conclude that the stream is a good quality stream.•There is a high number of class I organisms and a very low number of class III organisms so the stream at Powdermill has a high number of pollution intolerant macro-invertebrates•Weasels would be affected by the good quality stream because their food chain includes animals that eats organisms found in the stream. With good quality water the animals will be able to survive and the weasel will have a long healthy life•If the majority of the organisms found in Powdermill run were class III organisms the weasel would be affected because it would run out of food because the animals that eat the organisms in the stream would not have food so the weasel would run out of food and would die prematurely

Water Testing Data & Analysis

•The stream at Powdermill run is the healthiest stream of all of the three places. The stream is the water source that has the most dissolved oxygen•Nitrates and phosphates are fine in moderation but if there are too many the nitrates and phosphates would suffocate the plants in the water•The weasel would have a good diet because the animals that eat the bugs in the stream would be able to live easily and then the weasel would be able to eat them and live a long life•When the turbidity is high the predators wouldn’t be able to see their prey and it would affect the food chain of the weasel. Also if the temperature is too high the animals would not be able to survive and the weasel’s food chain would be affected

Soil Testing & Analysis• Potash, phosphorous,

nitrogen are important in the soil because it helps the plants grow and become strong and healthy

• Most soil has a pH of 4 which is highly acidic which is normal. Potash, nitrogen, phosphorous are all high in the soil

• When the chemicals are too high they are run off into the water and cause damage to the water and cause the plants in the water to overgrow which would suck the life out of the water source

Positive & Negative Factors

• Water quality affects the weasel because the animals would not be able to live on the organisms because the animals that they eat, the bugs in the stream

• If the soil’s chemicals are too high they will run-off into the stream and then the animals that eat the bugs in the stream will not be able to survive because they will be no bugs in the stream

• When there are too many nitrates and phosphates in the stream the bugs will eventually die because they will have the life sucked out of them. Farmland run-off and abandoned mine drainage are the main causes of pollution in PA streams

Conclusion

• That too many nitrates and phosphates will cause too much growth and suck out the life of the stream

• Learning that weasels eat snakes is very interesting because you wouldn’t think that weasels eat snakes because weasels are relatively small animals

• The effects of chemicals on different types of animals in the water

Works Cited

Animal Diversity Web. The Regents of the University of Michigan and its licensors, 2008. Web. 18 Apr. 2010.

"long-tailed weasel." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2010. Encyclopedia Britannica Online. 17 May. 2010 <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/347390/long-tailed-weasel>.

encyclopedia.com. N.p., 2008. Web. 16 Apr. 2010. <http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/ weasel.aspx>.