How many snails are in your garden?
Instructions
1. Walk through your garden and find 10 garden snails
2. Place a small dab of paint on their shell. This is harmless to the snail
3. Release the snails at different places in your garden
4. 1 week later, walk around your garden to find some more snails.
5. Use the formula below to work out the approximate number of snails in your garden
You will need:
- Small tin of non-lead based white paint
- Pen and Paper
Mark and recapture is just one technique used by ecologists to count animal populations.
Ecologists study the relationships between animal and plant communities.
Total population = __ ___ Total number snails marked__ ___
Total number of snails in new sample group
If you found 20 snails with 5 being marked, this means you have recaptured half of your original group of 10 marked snails. So the total population must be approximately 40 snails.
This answer is only a good guess, as anything could have happened to the snails over a week!
Number of snails marked in new sample group
