Bell Work: 9/15/14• At Nashville Zoo more than 24

cubs have been born in 14 litters since 2009. All of our clouded leopard cubs are raised by hand. This technique prevents parental predation and allows this normally nervous species to become acclimated to the sights and sounds of human interaction typical in an exhibit environment.

• Hand-raising also allows the Zoo to pair cubs at an early age. Adult male clouded leopards are known to be aggressive to potential mates to the point of severe injury and even death. Our research with breeding clouded leopards has revealed that pairing at an early age significantly reduces aggression and allows for more successful breeding pairs.

Read the conservation news from the Nashville Zoo At Grassmere to the left. After spending time researching the adaptations and behavioral characteristics of your animal in order to provide a habitat perfectly suited for survival, what is your opinion about these zoo keepers at the Nashville Zoo trying to change some of these innate behaviors?

Environmental Survival Challenge• Some zoologists are habitat specialists who are responsible for

designing animal exhibits and overseeing their construction. Some zoos, such as the Nashville Zoo, have natural disaster relief teams in place to work with these habitat designers to rebuild habitats destroyed in a storm.

• Challenge: You are a zoologist at the Nashville Zoo. A natural disaster has occurred destroying an organism’s habitat. Your challenge is to create a natural habitat in a controlled environment for a specific organism. You and your team will need to use your knowledge about animals—structures, adaptations, competition, size, food, niche, etc.—to plan how their habitat should look. Your team will design an enclosure and write a proposal for the zoo director or the director of a habitat design company to present to the class. You must design a scale drawing with the dimensions (perimeter and area) of your plan. The winning team’s plan will be sent to Nashville Zoo’s Natural Disaster Relief Team or to a habitat design company.

Essential Question to Ponder…

How can an organism’s structure, behavior or physiological adaptations be used to predict if the organism can survive in a specific environment?

StandardsSPI 0807.5.2 Analyze structural, behavioral, and physiological adaptations to predict which populations are likely to survive in a particular environment

Survivor? Predict which populations are likely to survive in a particular environment.

Plan• Reveal your

sketches.• How are your

sketches similar to your teammates?

• How are they different?

Plan • Take all the sketches from your team and make a collaborative sketch—an illustration that is a culmination of your team’s ideas.

• Label your sketch.• Make a materials

list & don’t forget to justify your materials. I need this TODAY!!!

• As you plan, make a list of steps you till take to build your prototype.

• Use a Post-It Note to “tweet” about the following question:

Describe a section of your animal’s habitat. Will this section of the habitat allow your animal to use its adaptations? Explain.

Tweet a response…