Part A - Introduction to the Ethogram

By the end of this activity you will have compiled a list of behaviours.

In the real world, ethologists spend long hours making field observations, often in bad weather, where they study animal behaviour. An ethogram is a list describing the behaviours observed. Sometimes these scientists supplement these observations with experiments performed either in the field or in the laboratory.

We already know a lot about many animals from reading books and watching films so we will not be performing any experiments on the animals. However, we will be taking advantage of being able to view the animals of Race Rocks in their natural habitat using real-time video available at racerocks.com. This is a unique opportunity as it allows you, the observer, to watch and yet have no impact on the environment or the animal's behaviour. So what you will be observing will be completely natural.   

You will be collecting data for two half-hour periods, and presenting the data as a time budget.  The data you gather will be submitted in a report at the end of this assignment.

Choosing your species to observe

If you are collecting data using the live video feeds from racerocks.com, you will have a limited number of species to choose from.  These include:

• California Sea Lion;
• Steller Sea Lion;
• Pacific Harbor Seal; or
• Glaucous-winged Gull (Sea Gull).

If you are collecting data from the archived video, you can choose from:

• California Sea Lion;
• Steller Sea Lion;
• Pacific Harbor Seal; or
• Glaucous-winged Gull (Sea Gull).

Lab A - The Ethogram: Determining Animal Behaviour

Research Question: What different behaviours does the sea lion or sea gull do during its stay at Race Rocks?

Purpose: The purpose of this exercise is to identify animal behaviour and put it into categories.

Materials:
You will need the following:

• Pen and paper
• Computer with Internet access

Procedure:

1. During your first observation period, sit with a partner and watch the video.
2. On a piece of paper, make a list of all the different types of behaviour that you observe.
3. As a class, come together and make a master list of behaviours.
4. Take the behaviours and start to categorise them. For instance, one behaviour that you may observe is "scratching" and it could go in a "resting" or it could go in a 'grooming' category. As a class discuss the different categories.
5. Go to the worksheet provided, like the one below, and organize the behaviours into broad categories and sub-categories. Items such as hunting should have sub-categories which describe them further.

When you have collected all behaviours that you think you will possibly observe, give each behaviour a code. This organization will help greatly when you gather data for the time budget.

Note: If an activity occurs too rapidly to be accurately timed, it may appear on the ethogram without a code.

Once you have your list of behaviours, go to Part B- The Time Budget