How Does Habituation to Touch Affect Sea Anemones' Ability to Feed?

Overview

Objectives/Goals Our experiment measured if the habituation of sea anemones (like they are touched in tide pools) affects their food intake and ability to grow and survive. Methods/Materials For sixty minutes, we touched two anemones every six minutes, another two every two minutes, and the last two were not touched. After the touching, the sea anemones were fed 25 brine shrimp. We observed the number of brine shrimp that each anemone did not ingest. The materials were six sea anemones, a tank in which salt water circulated, brine shrimp, eyedroppers, and our fingers. Results One of our important results was that sea anemone number 5, which was touched every two minutes, died after the third week. This might show that a great amount of touching is not good for anemones. Our key result was that anemones that were touched every two minutes ingested less than all the other anemones. However, the ones that were touched every six minutes ingested more than the anemones that were not touched at all. Conclusions/Discussion Our final conclusion was that the anemones that were not touched at all did ingest more than the ones that were touched every 2 minutes. However, sea anemones that were touched every six minutes ingested the most. There could have been errors in our project due to the small number of sea anemones, our ability to count, how hard we touched each anemone, and how we inserted the brine shrimp for feeding. Another source of error is if the sea anemones had trouble adjusting to their new environment.

Competition history

• CSEF 2003 Zoology · Entry S1906

Resources

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