Question

Describe natural selection and explain the key statements about natural selection using the Finches in Grant's study. Please help!

Answer 1

The Galápagos Islands are home to a famous group of birds called "Darwin's finches." Most taxonomists view these finches as belonging to thirteen separate species within four (or three) genera of a single family (or subfamily). All of the Galápagos finches are thought to have descended from one or a few pairs of ancestral birds that strayed from the South American mainland. Collected by Charles Darwin during his Beagle voyage, these finches have long been featured as significant examples of evolution. They are typically exhibited as a notable instance of "adaptive radiation," which is defined as the relatively rapid production of a number of new species from a small ancestral population expanding into unoccupied niches, especially thought to occur on isolated islands (see, for example, the high school biology text by Mader, pp. 522-523). But recently, as a result of the diligent and extensive field work of Peter and Rosemary Grant of Princeton University, "Darwin's finches" have become more important than ever as proof that evolution happens. Jonathan Weiner's well-written book The Beak of the Finch won the 1994 Pulitzer Prize for non-fiction, and brought to public attention the (alleged) exciting confirmation of Darwinian evolution provided by the work of the Grants and their team.