Background
Consider that the estimated number of species of all
life on the planet is between 3 and 100 million species. How are these
species distributed between the various taxa? In his book Biodiversity,
E.O. Wilson has chosen 19 major taxa, or groups of taxa, to show the distibution
of species. He uses the idea of a Species Scape. I have provided a copy
of this to you. Notice that a Species Scape is simply a landscape drawing
with 19 images in it. Each image is a member of one of the 19 taxa/groups.
The physical size of the organisms is proprotional to the perscentage of
total species found within that taxa/group.
Your job is to create a Species Scape,
Pie Chart, Block Chart, or physical model which represents each of these
taxa/groups proportional to their species persentages.
For example: There are 1,400,000 total
species in Wilson's example. The 751,000 species of insects represents
54% of life's species. On the other hand Kingdom Monera (bacteria) have
only 4,000 species or 0.3 % of life's species. Therefore the image of an
insect should be abpproximately 180 times as big as the bacteria (54%/0.3%
= 180).
Here are some examples of previous work:
The number of beads are proportional |
The clay forest with size proportional |
The world of Lego |
A snake with the length of its colored boundary proportional |
 |
 |
Parts of a Butterfly |
Traditional |
A Snake Scape |
Ellie has painted her toenails with colors proportional to species distribution |