Question
What the scientists did
Across the state of Ohio, thousands of volunteer scientists have been hiking familiar trails for more than 20 years with a specific task. As they walk their chosen trail each week from April to October, they identify and count every butterfly they can see within a certain distance of their path. Later, they submit that information to The Ohio Lepidopterists, a nonprofit dedicated to conservation and appreciation of butterflies, skippers and moths.
When Oregon State University ecologist Tyson Wepprich was choosing his post-graduate projects in 2017, using Ohio data to measure long-term changes in butterfly numbers “didn’t seem like exciting science,” he said.
But as public interest in insect declines grew, Wepprich realized that he had an opportunity in the volunteer-led Ohio project.
Wepprich and his team used more than 24,000 volunteer-conducted butterfly surveys to create a picture of butterfly populations in Ohio every year between 1996 and 2016. It’s not as simple as just adding all the surveys up from a particular day, though — one of the challenges of participatory science is that observations can vary drastically as observers learn to identify more species, get replaced by other volunteers or miss weeks of data collection.
Shapiro, the biologist from UC Davis, has been conducting his own butterfly monitoring in California for more than 40 years. His work, visiting 10 sites in central California’s coasts, valleys and mountains, is one of the only other long-term North American insect abundance projects.
“This, in many ways, is a better-designed study than mine, because mine was never intended to be a long-term monitoring study,” Shapiro said. While his data was designed to track short-term variations, the Ohio study was “designed from the beginning” to take advantage of a dedicated volunteer force willing to collect information every year for the foreseeable future.
What they found
The overall numbers of butterflies in Ohio have decreased year over year for the past two decades — about 2 percent each year. When the researchers compared that rate to other long-term studies, the general decline matched the results of monitoring programs in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Spain.
But the team wanted to understand why some species of butterflies were harder-hit than others, and why some actually increased their populations over the course of the study.
They looked to see if related species of butterflies were all doing better or worse, and did not find a pattern.
On the other hand, they did notice that butterflies more commonly found in southern Ohio tended to do better than the more northern butterflies, perhaps because they are already better suited to respond to the planet’s warming climate.
© NewsHour Productions LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Question
Read “Butterflies are disappearing in Ohio. Here’s what that means for insects everywhere” below to answer the question.
What does the first subheading suggest about how the section relates to the title?
(1 point)
Responses
It signals that the section will tell how scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio.
It signals that the section will tell how scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio.
It signals that the section will tell that scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio and why it matters.
It signals that the section will tell that scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio and why it matters.
It signals that the section will tell why scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio.
It signals that the section will tell why scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio.
It signals that the section will tell that scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio.
Across the state of Ohio, thousands of volunteer scientists have been hiking familiar trails for more than 20 years with a specific task. As they walk their chosen trail each week from April to October, they identify and count every butterfly they can see within a certain distance of their path. Later, they submit that information to The Ohio Lepidopterists, a nonprofit dedicated to conservation and appreciation of butterflies, skippers and moths.
When Oregon State University ecologist Tyson Wepprich was choosing his post-graduate projects in 2017, using Ohio data to measure long-term changes in butterfly numbers “didn’t seem like exciting science,” he said.
But as public interest in insect declines grew, Wepprich realized that he had an opportunity in the volunteer-led Ohio project.
Wepprich and his team used more than 24,000 volunteer-conducted butterfly surveys to create a picture of butterfly populations in Ohio every year between 1996 and 2016. It’s not as simple as just adding all the surveys up from a particular day, though — one of the challenges of participatory science is that observations can vary drastically as observers learn to identify more species, get replaced by other volunteers or miss weeks of data collection.
Shapiro, the biologist from UC Davis, has been conducting his own butterfly monitoring in California for more than 40 years. His work, visiting 10 sites in central California’s coasts, valleys and mountains, is one of the only other long-term North American insect abundance projects.
“This, in many ways, is a better-designed study than mine, because mine was never intended to be a long-term monitoring study,” Shapiro said. While his data was designed to track short-term variations, the Ohio study was “designed from the beginning” to take advantage of a dedicated volunteer force willing to collect information every year for the foreseeable future.
What they found
The overall numbers of butterflies in Ohio have decreased year over year for the past two decades — about 2 percent each year. When the researchers compared that rate to other long-term studies, the general decline matched the results of monitoring programs in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Spain.
But the team wanted to understand why some species of butterflies were harder-hit than others, and why some actually increased their populations over the course of the study.
They looked to see if related species of butterflies were all doing better or worse, and did not find a pattern.
On the other hand, they did notice that butterflies more commonly found in southern Ohio tended to do better than the more northern butterflies, perhaps because they are already better suited to respond to the planet’s warming climate.
© NewsHour Productions LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Question
Read “Butterflies are disappearing in Ohio. Here’s what that means for insects everywhere” below to answer the question.
What does the first subheading suggest about how the section relates to the title?
(1 point)
Responses
It signals that the section will tell how scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio.
It signals that the section will tell how scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio.
It signals that the section will tell that scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio and why it matters.
It signals that the section will tell that scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio and why it matters.
It signals that the section will tell why scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio.
It signals that the section will tell why scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio.
It signals that the section will tell that scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio.
Answers
Answered by
GPT-4o mini
The correct response is:
**It signals that the section will tell that scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio and why it matters.**
This response aligns with the title's implication of a significant finding regarding butterfly populations and the broader implications for insect populations overall.
**It signals that the section will tell that scientists discovered that butterflies were disappearing in Ohio and why it matters.**
This response aligns with the title's implication of a significant finding regarding butterfly populations and the broader implications for insect populations overall.
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