Week12 Draft2

In this experiment, we are testing the effect of a legume’s mass on oviposition preferences of the female bean beetle, specifically lima beans, black eye peas, and mung beans. Our control will be the mung bean group, on which the parental beetles were laid. Knowing that the beans on which they are laid will be the only food source for the larvae’s development, it must be necessary on the female’s part to lay eggs on beans that provide enough sustenance for better fitness of the offspring. Therefore- if the oviposition preferences of the female bean beetles are determined solely by the mass of the beans, then there would be an equal number of eggs per equal mass of beans, however, there would be a significantly greater number of eggs on individual beans that weigh more. We predict to find an equal number of eggs in each petri dish containing equal mass of beans, but on individual beans that weigh more, there would be more eggs overall. In other words, there should be more eggs per lima bean than black eyed pea or mung bean, and more eggs per black eyed pea than mung bean.