2021 Free Response · Set 1

Pesticide use has advantages, disadvantages, and unintended consequences on human health. Describe one benefit to human health that can result from the use of pesticides.

Identify one way chemical pesticides can enter the human body.

Cotton farmers in the southern United States used a chemical pesticide to control an insect cotton-crop pest over a 40-year period. To study the effectiveness of the pesticide as an insect pest-control strategy, traps were placed in treated cotton fields and the number of pests captured were compared to application rates for the pesticide. The results of the study are shown in the table below.

Use the data in the table to answer the following questions.

Identify the year when the pesticide was most effective at reducing the size of the pest population.

Describe the change in the number of crop insect pests in the cotton fields over time.

Explain how the change in the cotton-crop pesticide effectiveness between the initial application in 1975 and the latest application in 2015 illustrates genetic resistance in pests, based on the data in the table.

Describe TWO effects of pesticide use, other than death, on nontarget wildlife.

There are many problems associated with the repeated application of chemical pesticides to reduce pest populations.

Crop rotation is often used to reduce pesticide use. Describe the process of crop rotation.

Propose one reasonable method, other than crop rotation, of reducing the use of pesticides in agricultural practices while still maintaining a high crop yield.

Justify how the method proposed in (e)(ii) would provide a benefit to humans.

Describe a characteristic of a specialist species that would make the specialist species more likely to be negatively affected by habitat fragmentation than a generalist species.

A rapidly growing suburban municipality purchases nearby forested land and proposes a newly planned housing development, which would involve clear-cutting much of the area for the construction of single-family homes. While evaluating the land, the development committee discovers that development will encroach upon the habitat of a wood thrush population. The wood thrush is a solitary, territorial bird whose preferred habitat consists of large, intact densely forested areas. Wood thrush populations are also threatened by cowbirds. A cowbird lays her egg in an existing nest of a wood thrush. After the cowbird egg hatches, the cowbird pushes the unhatched wood thrush eggs out. The wood thrush parents raise the cowbird hatchling as their own.

Identify the symbiotic relationship between the wood thrush and the cowbird.

Describe one ecological advantage of leaving areas of undeveloped forest in the development plan as compared to clear-cutting the property.

Propose a solution that will minimize the effect of development on the resident population of wood thrush while still meeting the municipality's need for a housing development.

A male wood thrush needs a minimum of $800\ \text{m}^2$ of territory for reproduction. The municipal development committee has set a biodiversity preservation target of 275 male wood thrush territories. Calculate the area that must be set aside to support the goal of 275 male thrush territories. Show your work.

A real estate developer wants to build houses on the property. The plan will support 1,000 lots with a lot size of $1,100\ \text{m}^2$. The developer has proposed setting aside land equal to 10% of the size of each lot it sells. Calculate the maximum number of male wood thrush territories that could be created under this proposal. Show your work.

Calculate the percentage of each of the 1,000 lots that would need to be set aside in order to support the goal of 275 male wood thrush territories. Show your work.