Seasonal Changes of Drosophila as a Teaching Material for Upper Secondary School Biological Education

Abstract

Collection of the fruit fly, Drosophila, was conducted at Yashiro town in Hyogo prefecture from October 1986 to September 1987 at 2 week intervals. The collection results suggest that the collection procedure itself reported here will make a suitable teaching material in upper secondary school biology classes. The reasons are as follows:

(1) Different species were collected in different environments. For example, D. melanogaster was collected in Yashiro town, D. auraria was collected along the Chugoku highway and D. bizonata was collected at Mt. Mikusa,

(2) Different seasonal changes were observed in different species. For example, D. melanogaster increased in autumn, D. auraria and D. bizonata increased from early summer to autumn.

(3) The correlation between the number and temperature for each species was observed.