Name_________________
Data Nuggets developed by Michigan State University fellows in the NSF BEACON and GK-12 programs
1
Finding a Foothold
Featured scientists: Darrel Nash & Sarah Hall from Kentridge High School, Washington
Research Background:
Have you ever noticed that the ground at a beach has rocks of many different sizes?
These rocks, sand, and dirt are all called substrates. The types of substrate we see are
described by the size of the particles that cover the ground. These can range from large
boulders down to fine grains of sand and dirt, with many sizes in between. No matter
what type of substrate you see at the beach, you can find organisms that will live in or
on it. Just like there are different types of substrates, there are different types of
organisms that can live there. How can we determine which types of organisms prefer
which types of substrates? That is the job of field researchers!
Students and teachers at Kentridge High School have made many field trips to the
beach and have seen lots of organisms. Normally, they just noticed what they could see
easily in front of them. Students became interested to know how the type of substrate
influences which organisms will live there. They noticed that the snails in the aquarium
at school like to stick to the glass walls of the tank. Do snails and other shelled mollusks
found near the ocean, like chitons, periwinkles, whelks and limpets, also like to live on
large, stable substrates? The students went to beach to find out!
Mollusks have a
"foot" which may be
able to attach more
securely to larger
substrates, such as
boulders, and allow
them more room to
move. So, the
students expected to
find more mollusks
on boulders than on
other types of
substrates. To
gather the data
needed to answer
this question, the
students went to a
Students collecting mollusk data on different beach substrates
