Question

Question 1: Describe the 2 primary foraging modes seen in reptiles and amphibians and explain three features that are characteristics of organisms woth each mode and how they relate to forage strategy/sucess.

Question 2: Compare and contrast two mechanisms of prey capture (prior to swallowing) and use examples to illustrate the benefits and costs of each one.

Answer 1

1.The two foraging modes observed in amphibians are as follows-

Sit and Wait-They are seen mostly in anurans and it is energitically conserved as it required less movements.It requires good vision and cryptic colouration.The organisms having this are usually specialist but this startegy has very low capture rate.

Active-Take place in salmanders and it takes in generalist and is energetically expensive and needs well developed chemical senses.It has high capture rate though.

The reptiles have two types of foraging the active and ambush for eg as seen in lizard.In ambush the lizard just sit and waits for prey to come wheras in other one the lizard actively stalks its prey.They both are phylogenetically stable.

1.The prey can be catched by the active predator which hunts for the prey utilizing its energy and resources.Eg like fox and rabbit,lion and dear etc.The benefit is the more prey sureity as the predators uses its resources so are swift.The main disadvantage is the evolutinory a lot of resources gets utilized in this.

In other way the prey can be captured by eating the non living components like plants which hervibores do.The plants are fixed and also in large numbers so the resourses used in searching and capturing prey is less.Also biological magnification is least.The main disadvantage being the competition as the same plant resources gets eaten by many and digesting plants requires much energy.