Question

You are doing a mark-recapture experiment to determine the population size of the MendAliens living on an island in my back yard. Initially, you catch and mark 130 MendAliens, which you then release. Next, you capture 90 MendAliens, of which 20 aremarked. What is your estimate of the population size of MendAliens living on the island in my back yard?

Answer 1

585 MendAliens.

Explanation:

In this problem we are going to suppose that initially we catch and mark only part of the total MendAliens.

Initially, we catch and mark 130 MendAliens.

Then, we capture 90 of which 20 are marked.

We also are going to suppose that there is a linear relationship between the MendAliens we mark,catch and release.

To calculate the estimation of the population size of MendAliens living on the island in the back yard we write :

20 marked MendAliens ___ From a total of 90 we captured.

130 marked MendAliens ___ From a total of x that is our estimation.

`x=((130).(90))/(20)=585`

We estimate that the population size is 585 MendAliens.