Ecology:Ecosystems

J.Quigley2012

What is an organism? Organism: A single

living thing A fish A dog A pine tree A bacterium A human

What is a population? A population is a

group of organisms living in the same area. 10 caterpillars in my

backyard 5400 deer in Oregon 17,500 people in

Troutdale 1,000,000 bacteria

on/in my body

What is a community? A community is a

group of various populations that live in the same place and interact with one another: In a pond snails,

plants, bugs, small fish, big fish, ducks and beavers all interact with each other

What is an ecosystem? A community of

organisms in their physical environment.

Basically it is a community interacting with each other AND the non living parts of their environment

Ecosystem Example In the pond all of

the organisms (fish, bugs, ducks…) interact with the pond water, sun, oxygen, soil, rocks and other non living parts of the environment

Biosphere All of the

ecosystems together on the planet.

Bio means life and sphere is a round “ball”

Biosphere is the Earth

Biotic Something that is

biotic is living or once was living. Tree Frog Paper A dead flower Fungus Bone

Abiotic Something that is

abiotic is not living and never has been alive. Rock Concrete Oxygen Water Sun

What is a habitat? A habitat is the

place where an organism lives A pond for a fish The rain forest for

a monkey House for me The mountains for

a mountain lion The ocean for a

whale

Biodiversity Suppose you counted

all the species in a pine forest and then counted all the species in a tropical rain forest. Do you think the number of specie would be the same for both?

NO! The rain forest has a lot more species than the pine forest…

The rain forest has greater biodiversity.

biodiversity

The variety of organisms in an area is called biodiversity Abiotic factors can have a big influence on biodiversity Limited food can also have an influence on biodiversity

Biodiversity Ecosystems that

have greater biodiversity are often more able to resist damage.

Damage can be caused by: severe weather events (fire, flood, hurricane) or human activities (pollution, clear cutting, building cities)

Succession

When a disaster happens (fire, flood, clear cutting, volcano, tornado) happens and an ecosystem is destroyed… it slowly rebuilds itself

The rebuilding of an ecosystem is called succession

Biomes A biome is a large region characterized by a specific kind of climate and certain kinds of plant and animal communities

Biomes Climate is the average weather conditions in an area over a long period of time. Climate includes average temperature and average precipitation (rain)

Land Biomes Polar Ice Tundra Taiga Temperate forest Tropical forest Temperate grasslands Savanna Desert

Water Biomes Freshwater (rivers, streams, ponds,

lakes) Wetlands Estuary Marine (oceans and seas)

Coral reefs Open Ocean Deep Ocean