Differences in foraging habits during the day and night time in the green frog, Rana clamitans.

Abstract

There are three types of foragers: sit-and-wait predators, hunting predators, and optimal foragers. While these foragers look for their food, do they show exploitative or interference competition? I did my study on green frogs, Rana clamitans, at UMBS in Pellston, Michigan. I wanted to see if green frogs forage more actively during the daytime or at nighttime. I also wanted to see what type of foraging method did the frogs convey and why? I also wanted to see if the frogs portrayed any type of competition, and if they did if it was exploitative or interference competition. I hypothesized that the green frogs wil hunt for their food during the daytime and display exploitative competition. I found out that the green frogs are sit-and-wait predators during the day but hunting predators at night. Therefore, they are more active during the night. During both day and night, the frogs showed the less aggressive act of exploitative competition. The results supported by hypothesis that the frogs are hunting predators and show exploitative competition; but refuted that the frogs forage during the day.