General Ecology Terms

1
General Ecology Terms

• 1. Biotic Factor of or relating to life caused
  or produced by living beings. Ex. plants,
  animals, any organism.
• 2. Community all the populations of organisms
  living in a given area.
• 3. Consumer There are two kinds Primary
  consumers are organisms that eat plants.
  Secondary consumers are organisms that eat
  animals that eat plants. Also called carnivores.
• 4. Decomposers An organism that feeds on dead
  material and causes its mechanical or chemical
  breakdown. For example Fungi and bacteria are
  decomposers.
• 5. Ecosystem All the living organisms interacting
  with each other and the non-living
  characteristics of an area.
• 6. Habitat A native environment of an animal or
  plant which provides food, water, shelter and
  space suitable to its needs.
• 7. Limiting factor The condition which inhibits
  the expansion of a species.
• 8. Populations individuals of one species that
  occupies a particular geographic area
• 9. Producer Green plants that produce their own
  food from soil and sunlight.
• 10. Succession The gradual change of one
  community by another.

2
More Ecology Terms

• 11. organic Pertaining to compounds containing
  carbon plus hydrogen. Also refers to living
  things or the materials made by living things.
• 12. inorganic Not containing carbon and hydrogen
  in combination. Not from living things. Ex.,
  minerals, water, oxygen, carbon dioxide etc.
• 13. biosphere The portion of the earth and its
  atmosphere in which living organisms exist or
  that is capable of supporting life.
• 14. heterotroph "eats others." An organism that
  must consume other organisms to fuel its
  metabolism
• 15. autotroph "self eater." Organisms capable of
  producing their own food.
• 16. Niche the way in which an organism uses its
  environment.
• 17. Detritus particles of organic material that
  provide food for organisms at the base of a food
  web Ex leaf litter
• 18. Abiotic Factor physical, or nonliving, factor
  that shapes an ecosystem.

3
Ecology

• branch of science concerned with the
  interrelationship of organisms and their
  environments.

4
Photosynthesis Chemosynthesis
Producer Green plants that produce their own food
from soil and sunlight
autotroph "self eater." Organisms capable of
producing their own food.
5
Food Chain

• food chain/food web All the interactions of
  predator and prey, included along with the
  exchange of nutrients into and out of the soil.
  These interactions connect the various members of
  an ecosystem, and describe how energy passes from
  one organism to another.

6
Food Web
7
Ecological Pyramids

• Ecologist use ecological pyramids to represent
  the energy relationships among trophic levels.
• There are 3
• types of
• ecological
• pyramids.

 
8
Pyramid of Energy

• A pyramid of energy the total amount of incoming
  energy at each successive level.
• Notice that energy (in the form of heat) is lost
  going from one trophic level to another.

9
Pyramid of Biomass

• A pyramid of biomass show the total mass of
  living tissue at each level.
• This pyramid of biomass shows for example, that a
  large amount of grass is needed to feed a single
  rabbit and a large number of rabbits is needed to
  nourish a single hawk.

10
Pyramid of Numbers

• A pyramid of numbers illustrates the total number
  of organisms at each level
• In a grassland, for
• example, a large amount of grass (producers)
  is needed to support the herbivores (primary
  consumers).

2000 grass plants25 voles1 barn owl
However
11
Pyramid of Numbers

• pyramids of numbers do not always appear as
  pyramids. Look at this one
• If the producer (in this example an oak tree) is
  a large plant, then the number of primary
  consumers which feed on the producer
  (caterpillars in this example) will be much
  larger in numbers.

12
Water Cycle
13
Carbon and Oxygen Cycle
14
Phosphorus cycle
15
Nitrogen Cycle
Denitrification When nitrogen in compounds is
released into the air
79 of the air is nitrogen
Nitrogen fixation the assimilation of
atmospheric nitrogen by soil bacteria and its
release for plant use
Nitrification the oxidation of ammonium compounds
in dead organic material into nitrates and
nitrites by soil bacteria (making nitrogen
available to plants)
16
Biogeochemical Cycles

• All of the matter that cycles through the earth
  and living things. Ex. Carbon, Oxygen, Nitrogen,
  Phosphorous, Water, etc.
• The difference between matter and energy flow is
  that energy can flows in one direction but matter
  (or nutrients) is neither created nor destroyed
  it gets recycled.

17
Biological Magnification

• The process by which concentrations of a harmful
  substance increases in organisms at higher
  trophic levels in a food chain or food web.
• It affects the entire food web but top-level
  carnivores are at highest risk.
• 1962 Rachel Carson wrote Silent Spring about the
  dangers of a pesticide called DDT, which was
  banned in 1970. One effect of DDT was to make the
  eggs of large fish eating birds so fragile that
  they could not survive intact.

18
Biotic Factors

• Biotic relating to, or caused by living organisms
  
• Biotic factor Factors such as parasitism,
  disease, competition and predation (one animal
  eating another) would also be classified as
  biotic factors.

19
Abiotic Factors

• refers to nonliving objects, substances or
  processes.
• The abiotic factors of the environment include
  light, temperature, and atmospheric gases.

20
Symbiosis - Organisms and their interactions with
other organisms

• Parasitism-relationship in which one species, the
  parasite, benefits at the expense of the other,
  the host

21
Symbiosis- Mutualism

• An association between organisms of two different
  species in which each member benefits

22
Symbiosis - Commensalism

• relationship between two organisms of different
  species in which one derives some benefit while
  the other is unaffected.

23
Succession

• The gradual and orderly process of change in an
  ecosystem brought about by the progressive
  replacement of one community by another until a
  stable climax community is established.  
• Lichens

24
Pond Succesion

25
Mount St. Helens
1982
1982
2002
26
Growth of Populations

• To study the relationships between organisms,
  ecologists need to know how organisms change over
  time. How many individuals are born? How many
  die? How many organisms live in an area at any
  given time? To answer these questions, ecologist
  study populations.

27
Exponential growth

• Growth is accelerating. When introduced into
  a favorable environment with an abundance of
  resources, a small population may undergo
  geometric, or exponential growth.

28
Logistic Growth

• When growth encounters environmental resistance,
  (competition, predation, parasitism, crowding and
  death due to natural disasters) populations
  experience an S-shaped or logistic growth curve.

29
Limiting Factors
30
Density Dependent Factors

• Become limiting only when the population density
  (the number of organism per unit area) reaches a
  certain level.
• These factors operate most strongly when a
  population is large and dense
• They do not affect small, scattered populations
  greatly.

Predation
31
Density Independent Factors

• Affect all populations in similar ways,
  regardless of the population size
• Unusual weather, natural disasters, seasonal
  cycle, and certain human activities, such as
  damming rivers and clear-cutting forests are all
  examples of density-independent limiting factors

Tsunami
32
(No Transcript)
33
(No Transcript)
34
(No Transcript)
35
Using Your Conservation Project Answer the
following Questions.

1. Identify four different populations.
2. Identify four biotic factors.
3. Name one primary consumer.
4. Identify two autotrophs.
5. Identify two heterotrophs.
6. Identify four abiotic factors.
7. Identify four organic items.
8. Name one secondary consumer.

36

• 9. Identify two producers.
• 10. Identify four inorganic items.
• 11. Identify two decomposers.
• 12. Using 4 organisms illustrate a basic food
  chain.
• 13. Using 10 organisms illustrate a basic food
  web.
• 14. Using 4 organisms illustrate a energy
  pyramid.
• 15. Explain the problem that is causing your
  environment to be destroyed. (at least 20 words)