Arthropods are insects and arachnids, including spiders, ants, ticks, beetles, flies, scorpions .
They are important components of any food web . There are many different kinds and in a single collection you can find arthropods which are decomposers , herbivores , predators , and parasites . They are fairly easy to collect. Using the protocol, you will record the arthropods collected in your schoolyard. From your observations you can investigate how the population compares to those found at other landscape types where CAP LTER scientists are collecting data.