Summary
Summary Ecology
Everything you need to know to get a 9 in this topic
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Organism compete with other species for some resources. Organisms need things from theirenvironment and from other organisms in order to survive and reproduce:
Plants need light and space, and water and mineral from the soil
Animals need space (territory), food, water and mates
In a community, each species depends on other species for things such as food, shelter, pollination
and seed disposal; this is called interdependence. The interdependence of all living things in an
ecosystem means that any major change in the ecosystem can have far reaching effects. In some
communities, all the species and environmental factors are in balance so that the population size are
roughly constant. These are called stable communities(tropical rainforest and ancient oak woodland)
Abiotic factors include: Oxygen level
Moisture level Soil pH and mineral content
Light intensity A change in the environment could be an increase or decrease in
Temperature abiotic factors. These changes can affect the size or population in
Carbon dioxide level a community. This means the can also affect the population size of
Wind intensity and direction other organisms that depend on them.
Biotic factors include:
New predators arriving A change in the environment could be the introduction of a new
Competition biotic factor. These changes can also affect the size of population
New pathogens in a community, which can have knock-on effect because of
Availability of food interdependence.
Organisms, including microorganisms, are adapted to live in different environmental conditions. The
features or characteristics that allow them to do this are called adaptations. Adaptation can be:
Structural: these are features of an organism’s body structure, e.g. shapes or colour
Behavioural: these are ways that organisms behave. Many species migrate t warmer
climates during the winter to avoid the problems of living in cold conditions
Functional: these are things that go inside an organism’s body that can related to processes
like reproduction and metabolism (all the chemical reaction happening in the body)
Microorganisms have a huge variety of adaptations so that they can live in a wide range of
environments. Some microorganisms are known as extremophiles because they’re adapted to live in
very extreme conditions.
Food chains always start with a producer. Producers make their own food using the energy from the
Sun. Producers are usually green plants or algae, they make glucose by photosynthesis. When a
green plant produces glucose, some of it is used to make other biological molecules in the plant.
These biological molecules are the plant’s biomass; the mass of the living material. Biomass can be
thought of as energy stored in a plant. Energy is transferred through living organisms in an
ecosystem when organisms eat other organism. Producers are eaten by primary consumers, which
are eaten by secondary consumers, which are consumed by tertiary consumers.
Consumers that hunt and kill other animals are called predators, and their prey is what they eat. In a
stable community containing prey and predators: 1. The population of any species is usually limited
by the amount of food available 2. If population of prey increases so will the population of predators
3. However as the population of predators increases, the number of prey will decrease.
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