Flowing-Water Ecosystems

• Rivers, streams, creeks

• Plenty of dissolved oxygen

• Turtles and beavers make home down stream

Standing-Water Ecosystems

• Lakes and Ponds

• Plankton: general term for the tiny, free-floating

organisms that live in both freshwater and saltwater.

– Phytoplankton: unicellular algae

– Zooplankton: feed on phytoplankton

Freshwater wetlands

• An ecosystem where water covers the soil or is present at or near the surface for at least part of the year.– Bogs – Marshes– Swamps

Estuaries

• Where the river meets the sea• Freshwater and saltwater mixed

• Detritus: tiny pieces of organic material that provide for organisms at the base of some aquatic food webs.

Salt Marshes

• Temperate-zone estuaries

• Salt-tolerant grasses above low-tide line

• Sea grasses under water

Mangrove Swamps

• Tropical coastal wetlands

• Found in Southern Florida and Hawaii

• Several species of salt-tolerant trees

Marine Zones

• Salt water• Photic zone: where sunlight can reach• Aphotic zone: sunlight cannot reach.• Divided into intertidal, coastal, and open

ocean zones.

Intertidal Zone

• Zonation: the prominent horizontal banding of organisms that live in a particular habitat.

Coastal Ocean

• From the outer edge of the intertidal zone to the outer edge of the continental shelf.

• Kelp forests

Coral Reefs

• Hard calcium carbonate skeletons make up their primary structure.

• Plants or animals?????????

Open Ocean

• More than 90% of Earth’s ocean• Examples of animals that occupy this zone:

Benthic Zone

• The ocean FLOOR.• Dependent on detritus