By Brittany Brinkley Nick LaFaves 1 st block Environmental Science The Morgans Sphinx Moth This odd moth has a tongue of nearly 12 inches long which is more than triple the length of its body ID: 355522
Download Presentation The PPT/PDF document "Coevolution of the Morgan’s Sphinx mot..." is the property of its rightful owner. Permission is granted to download and print the materials on this web site for personal, non-commercial use only, and to display it on your personal computer provided you do not modify the materials and that you retain all copyright notices contained in the materials. By downloading content from our website, you accept the terms of this agreement.
Slide1
Coevolution of the Morgan’s Sphinx moth and Darwin’s Orchid
By: Brittany BrinkleyNick LaFave’s 1st blockEnvironmental ScienceSlide2
The Morgan’s Sphinx Moth
This odd moth has a tongue of nearly 12 inches long which is more than triple the length of it’s body. While this is impressive and wildly interesting, one might wonder why a moth would need such a long tongue. The answer is simple- It has adapted to it’s main food source, Darwin’s Orchid. Slide3
Darwin’s Orchid
The Darwin’s Orchid stores it’s pollen at the bottom of a really long tube beginning at the opening of the petals.Because of this, the only animal able to collect it’s pollen is the Morgan’s Sphinx moth. Said pollination is necessary for both the Orchid to reproduce and for the moth to eat.
The two species enjoy a relationship of mutualism. Slide4
A Need For Coevolution
Over time, the stems of the Darwin’s Orchid grew longer. This was unfortunate for the Morgan’s Sphinx moth because only moths with longer tongues that the rest could survive Only the Orchids that were pollinated could reproduce. Slide5
How Coevolution Happened
As the moths with shorter tongues died of starvation, only those moths with long tongues were able to survive and reproduce. So, as the orchid tubes got longer, the moth tongues got longer so that both species could still receive the basics of life through their mutualistic relationship. Slide6
How They PollinateSlide7
References
http://education-portal.com/academy/lesson/coevolution-examples-definition-quiz.html#lessonhttp://education-portal.com/cimages/multimages/16/moth_flower4.
png
http://static.ddmcdn.com/gif/pollinators-morgans-sphinx-and-
flower.jpg
http://blog.hmns.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/giant-sphinx-moth-4x6-300x222.
jpg
http://www-tc.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/assets/swf/1/pollination-game/images/poll-3-
cometorchid.jpg