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Ants PP

Submitted by ekirchner on Sat, 11/30/2019 - 13:21

The activity of P. occidentalis, harvester ants, has been shown to enrich soil nutrients around their mounds due to the ants’ movement of particles from soil nearby. The rudimentary soil composition in certain areas has also influenced the density and variation of ant populations2  present in that environment. In our experiment, the effects of salinity on the harvester ants burrowing behaviors were tested. 

Hypothesis: The ants will burrow more in the sand where the salinity is lower.

Half of an ant farm was filled with regular, untouched sand, while the other half was filled with sand where the salinity was manipulated to be that of seawater (35 ppt). Eight ants were added to the farm and left to burrow for 6 days, while every few days their food and water were restocked. The burrowing  length results and general observations were recorded and the Mann-Whitney U test was used to analyze the results. 

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Comments

This is an interesting study- is the Mann-Whitney U test a standard test for burrowing in just insects?

This seems like an intersteing study- What does the Mann-Whitney U test determine based on the results?

I like your hypothesis! I noticed the numbers denoting citations, you might want to include the sources.