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BIO113 Studying Mammals Unit 2: Studying Mammals: The Insect Hunters - OPEN University
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Open University
S182_2 10 Hours
Introductory
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Course Description
Sixty-five million years ago, animal and
plant life were very different from nowadays, but there were rat-sized
placental mammals living successfully on the ground. They were insect
eaters, i.e. insectivores, feeding on the vast numbers of insects and
other invertebrates living in soil, leaf litter and low-lying
vegetation. Insectivore means ‘insect eater’, and in this unit we will
explore the world of insect-eating mammals, classified together on the
basis of a reasonably close evolutionary relationship.
This is the second in a series of units about
studying mammals. To get the most from these units, you will need
access to a copy of The Life of Mammals (2002) by David
Attenborough, BBC Books (ISBN 0563534230), and The Life of Mammals (2002) on DVD, which
contains the associated series of ten BBC TV programmes. OpenLearn unit S182_8 Studying mammals: life in the trees
contains samples from the DVD set. You should begin each unit by
watching the relevant TV programme on the DVD and reading the
corresponding chapter in The Life of Mammals. You will be asked
to rewatch specific sequences from the programme as you work through the
unit.
By the end of this unit you
should be able to:
- describe the lifestyle of
a variety of insect eaters, from four orders;
- give examples of adaptations linked to feeding in
insect eaters;
- explain the limited
extent to which insectivores can be regarded as ‘primitive’;
- characterise typical adult mammalian dentition and
understand dental formulae;
- recognise
teleology and write down accounts of evolution that do not assume
purpose or direction;
- describe the
relationship between surface area, volume, body mass and BMR;
- identify strategies that insect eaters use to cope
with cold and food shortage;
- explain
the events of bat and hedgehog hibernation and the evidence for the
control of this process.
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Introduction
 Introduction
Resource- Sixty-five million years ago,
animal and plant life were very different from nowadays, but there were
rat-sized placental mammals living successfully on the ground. They were
insect eaters, i.e. insectivores,...
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1 Meeting the insect eaters
- 1 Meeting the insect eaters Resource
- As you work through this unit you
will come across boxes, like this one, which give you advice about the
study skills that you will be developing as you progress through the
unit. To avoid breaking up...
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2 How insect eaters obtain their food
- 2.1 Mammalian dentition Resource
- Insects are generally very small
animals. Many kinds are hard work to collect and not very nutritious
because a high proportion of their mass is a protective and indigestible
outer layer, called cuticle....
- 2.2 Feeding techniques Resource
- In Activity 1, below, you are
asked to make notes from a TV sequence and then select some of the
information from your notes and combine it with some from LoM into a
single short piece of writing. Check...
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3 Adaptations linked to feeding in insect
eaters
- 3.1 Introduction Resource
- How evolution proceeds is
obviously of central importance when studying mammals. Of fundamental
importance to the way evolution works is the notion of natural
selection, and in S182_3 Studying mammals:...
- 3.2 Shrews
Resource
- Drawing on the notes you made
about shrews in Activity 1, describe in a couple of sentences the water
shrew's strategy for searching for and catching insect larvae.
- 3.3 Moles
Resource
- In this section, you will meet one
of the ways in which scientists are very precise about the way that
they use ordinary words. Spot the difference between ‘The golden mole
evolved webbed hind feet so...
- 3.4 Anteaters Resource
- View ‘The Insect Hunters’ on the
DVD from 22.40–26.54, which shows the giant anteater, and make notes on
what you see. On the basis of your notes, what features of the giant
anteater could be regarded...
- 3.5 Bats
Resource
- There are two more activities in
this section that give you more practice in writing. You will see that
you are again given an approximate number of words to aim for in your
answer. This number is a guide...
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4 Thinking about adaptation
- 4 Thinking about adaptation Resource
- Section 3 identified a range of
adaptations in insect eaters, most linked with their mode of feeding.
Particular structures are identified as having particular functions. But
there are problems with the...
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5 Temperature regulation and the consequence
of size
- 5.1 Introduction Resource
- If you have already worked through
S182_1 Studying mammals: a winning design, you'll be aware (from
Section 5) that animals break down their food for conversion into usable
forms of energy; thus, breakdown...
- 5.2 Body size and metabolic rate Resource
- Figure 6 is a slightly more
complex graph than those used in S182_1. In particular, the masses of
the mammals that are plotted on the horizontal axis vary so much that a
normal scale would squeeze together...
- 5.3 Body size and surface area Resource
- You will be using some more maths
in this section. Remember that areas are measured in units such as m2,
which is read as metres squared or, more usually, square metres. Volumes
are measured in units such...
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6 Strategies for coping with cold and food
shortage
- 6.1 Toughing it out Resource
- For small insectivorous mammals,
the best solution to the problem of obtaining sufficient energy for
their requirements, notably the maintenance of body temperature, is to
feed continuously. But in temperate...
- 6.2 Opting out Resource
- This last section of the unit
contains, I think, some of the most challenging science that you have
met so far. Take it slowly, translating all the abbreviations in your
head as you come to them (read...
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References and Acknowledgements
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There are currently no items in this folder.
Copyright 2007,
by the Contributing Authors.
Cite/attribute Resource.
administrator. (2010, January 30). BIO113 Studying Mammals Unit 2: Studying Mammals: The Insect Hunters - OPEN University. Retrieved September 04, 2010, from Free University Courses OCW Courses OpenCourseWare Freeversity Foundation Web site: http://www.freeversity.org/science-and-mathematics/biology/bio113-studying-mammals-unit-2-studying-mammals-the-insect-hunters-open-university.
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