The story of the peppered moths

The story of the peppered moths

Once upon a time, there was a specie of moth

called the peppered moth.

The moths lived in the country of England, flying around and

doing moth things all day.

Of course, moths have predators. The

predators of the peppered moth are

birds. But enough new baby peppered moths were born every year

so that the birds didn’t eat all of them.

As it turns out, there were two different types of peppered moths. There are light colored moths and

dark colored moths.

For a long time, they lived together in England, happily flying and doing

moth things.

Then, one day, the humans invented machinery. The humans called this the

Industrial Revolution, and it produced lots of soot.

The soot clung to trees and buildings, making them

black.

The birds found it very easy to eat the light

colored peppered moths, but not so easy to eat

the dark colored peppered moths. The

dark colored peppered moths were

camouflaged against the dark buildings.

So, guess what happened to the light and dark

populations of the peppered moth?

There were many more dark colored peppered moths than

there were light colored peppered moths.

Industrial Revolution

Until, one day, when the

humans decided to clean the

buildings. They found cleaner ways to make things in their factories, and the buildings went back to being light

colored again.

Now, the birds ate

mostly dark colored

peppered moths

because the light ones

were camouflaged

better.

What do you think happened to the populations of

peppered moths now?

Now, the light colored peppered moths are much more common than the dark

colored peppered moths.

Industrial Revolution

Clean buildings

Evolution of Peppered Moth

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyRA807djLc

Animal Adaptations

(2 mins)Camouflage

(5 mins)

The End

This has been a production of the Peppered moth publishing company, owned and operated by the light and dark colored peppered moths of jolly old

England.

No, really, this is the end.

You can stop watching now.

The End