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Challenge Team Abstract

Team Number: 030 School Name: Bosque Preparatory School Area of Science: Environmental Sciences Project Title: Modeling Black Bear Populations

Our team will develop a model of the Black Bear population in the Rocky Mountains and predict the effects of growing residential areas on the bear population. To create an accurate model of the bear population, a combination of modeling and simulation methods will be used. We will then study the effects of the different biological factors, such as rainfall, hunting, availability of food, and changes to the natural habitat on the bear population. We will incorporate some of these variables into our program. Users of our software will be able to change these variables to simulate changes in the bears' environment and explore the effects of these factors on the bear population.

We hope to discover whether the bear population will increase or decrease as time goes by and what factors contribute to each kind of change. We chose this problem because many things have been said on the news about bears that came into cities during the summer, which were then taken back to the mountains to be released. Due to the increasing amount of human contact in the past few years, we want to determine what can be done to protect the bear population.

Team Members

Team Mail

• Samuel R. Ashmore
• Nicole D. Mumma
• Kenny E. Sutherland

Sponsoring Teachers

• Debra M. Loftin
• Dorothy I. Ashmore

Project Advisor(s)

• Geoffrey Comber
• Hal Meyer