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1. You have a lot of pet goldfish in a tank in your living room.You started your fish colony a couple of years ago from just 4goldfish that were from the pet store (likely heavily inbred =verylittle genetic variation). One day you are cleaning the tank andnotice a new juvenile fish with an unusual red spot on his tail. Itis the only one in the population with this spot. What might beinfluencing this population? Why?

1. You are a chicken farmer in Hyattsville, MD and you have lotsof chickens. Some lay brown eggs and some lay white eggs. By doingsome quick counts over the past few weeks you see that yourchickens lay about 80% white eggs and 20% brown eggs. A flash floodstrikes your farm the next week. You save two of your 6 coops, therest of the chickens are washed away. You move your remaining luckychickens to higher ground, re-building the farm. Six months later,you re-do your egg count to find that your chickens are laying 60%brown eggs and 40% white eggs. What might be influencing thispopulation? Why?

1. Bower birds are unique to Australia. These ground dwellingbirds build elaborate grass nests and decorate them with brightlycolored objects (often bits of trash and plastic) to attract afemale. The birds use all sorts of colorful items and arrange theirdisplays to try to be most appealing to the female (either usingall one color of item or creating a rainbow jumble of plastictrash!) and arrange them artfully to attract females. The femaleschoose their mates based on the brightness and elaborateness of themale’s nest displays. Why might these birds have evolved into suchfantastic animal architects?

1. You decide to move to a remote island in Polynesia to conductAnthropological ethnographic fieldwork. However, you refuse toleave your two Maine Coon cats behind, so you bring them with youto the island. The local stray cats on the island are all shorthaired, striped brown tabby cats. Your cats love to explore so youlet them outside every night. A few years into your fieldwork youstart to notice that the local island cats are looking differentthese days. You see many with bushy tails and some with long fur.What might be influencing this population? Why?