Question 2: Describe Achieved

Practises Navigation over long distances

The indigo bunting (Passerina cyanea) makes a long journey every year, and migrates only at night. It flies roughly 2000 km each way between its breeding grounds in eastern North America and its wintering grounds, which stretch from southern Florida to southern Central America; the paper shows both on a map.

Define migration, describe the biological rhythm shown and the likely environmental cue for it, and describe a navigation method the bunting could use at night.

The 2022 paper, page 5 ↗ Marking schedule, page 3 ↗

Work it out

Try it on paper first. Stuck? Take one hint at a time.

1 What is migration?
A mass journey that animals make each year or season, from where they breed to somewhere with good food and suitable temperatures, and back: true migration includes the return.
2 Which biological rhythm is a yearly migration?
A circannual rhythm, one with a cycle of about a year.
3 What environmental cue probably triggers it?
Shortening day length in late summer and autumn, or a steady drop in temperature.
4 How could the bunting navigate at night?
By the stars (stellar navigation), steering by their positions; or by the Earth’s magnetic field, which tells it where it is in relation to the field.
5 What does migrating gain the bunting?
It escapes the northern winter, so more birds survive it, and it returns to breed when conditions are good.

Answer Migration is a mass journey made each year or season, from where animals breed to somewhere with good food and suitable temperatures, and back. Being yearly, the bunting’s migration is a circannual rhythm, probably triggered by shortening day length or falling temperatures. At night it can navigate by the stars or by the Earth’s magnetic field. Migrating lets more buntings survive the winter and return to breed in good conditions.

What the marker wanted

Achieved Describes, one point each: migration; the rhythm as circannual; the cue (falling temperature or shortening days); a navigation method usable at night (magnetic field or stars); and a benefit of migration for the bunting. Four make A4.

The schedule marks the question as one answer from N0 to E8. Achieved points count first: one or two give N1 or N2, three A3, four A4. Above that, two Merit points give M5 and three M6. In 2022 Question Two, one cost and one benefit, each tied to survival, give E7; two of each give E8.

In our words, from NZQA’s 2022 marking schedule.

Common mistake

Answering the bullet points as a numbered list. NZQA’s 2022 report advises using them to shape one connected answer to the question, not answering each in turn.

How did it go?

Got it moves it further out. Review brings it back tomorrow.