Question

Phoebe is observing a group of snowy egrets in the lake near her home to determine the main elements of the egrets' diet. She observes the egrets' behavior for four weeks and records the types of prey eaten in the table below. What can Phoebe infer from the data in the table?

Week 1Week 2Week 3Week 4

Insects13201815 Crawfish8152022 Fish3111312 Other/unknown528 4

Answer 1

Location 1

Location 2

Location 3

Location 4

Insects

13

20

18

15

Crawfish

8

15

20

22

Fish

3

11

13

12

Other

5

2

8

4

Other birds compete with the egrets for food sources at location 2.

Crawfish eat more fish than the egrets do at location 1.

Egrets that prefer crawfish are more likely to frequent location 4.

Egrets prefer fish to insects at location 3.

Answer 2

These options are part of the question;
A. Fish are more susceptible to disease than insects are.

B. The egrets prefer crawfish over fish.

C. The availability of insects fluctuates more than that of crawfish.

D. Egrets can catch fish more easily than crawfish

Answer; the correct option is B. The egrets prefer crawfish over fish
To determine the main elements of the egret’s diet using the data in the table given, it will be observed that craw fish is the prey mostly eaten by the snowy egret because it has the highest number recorded for the four weeks while observing the egret’s behavior. Therefore, Phoebe can infer from the data in the table that the snowy egrets prefer crawfish over other preys.