PRACTICAL Name:

Evolution by natural selection

You need:
■ sheet of white paper ■ clock/watch with 'second' hand ■ 30 white circles (made with hole
■ newspaper ■ 30 newspaper circles (made with punch)
■ forceps hole punch)
■ coloured pencils

In this exercise, you will simulate how predators locate prey in

different environments. You will analyse how camouflage (colour and
pattern) affect an organism’s ability to survive in certain environments.

Method
1 Work in pairs. Place a sheet of white paper on the table. One
student should spread 30 white circles and 30 newspaper circles
over the surface while the other student (the ‘predator’) isn’t
looking.
2 The ‘predator’ will then use forceps to pick up as many of the
circles as he or she can in 15 seconds. This corresponds to the
predator capturing and eating the prey species.
3 This trial should be repeated with white circles on a newspaper
background, newspaper circles on a white background, and
newspaper circles on a newspaper background.

Record the data in the chart below.

Extension
Starting Population Number ‘eaten’
● Find out the meaning
Trial Background Newspaper White White Newspaper of the term Industrial
1 white 30 30 Melanism.
2 white 30 30 ● Hospital managers are
3 newspaper 30 30 very worried about
hospital infections.
4 newspaper 30 30
Explain how natural
selection might lead
Questions to antibiotic-resistant
a What type of tree surface is represented by the ‘newspaper’
strains of bacteria.
background?
● How do the stripes on
b Which moth coloration (pale or dark) is the best adaptation for a a zebra help it to avoid
‘smoke-polluted’ background? How do you know? predators? Do the
c Following trial 1, what has happened to the frequency of the stripes on a tiger have
allele for ‘light’ colouration? the same effect?

d Moths which survive i.e. are not eaten by predators, can pass
on their alleles when they reproduce. How does the simulation
model natural selection?

© OUP: this may be reproduced for class use solely for the purchaser’s institute