Limiting Factors are things that prevent a population from growing any larger
examples: food, water, light, living space, temperature, competition, disease, etc.
Ecology - the study of all the living and nonliving components within an ecosystem
Organisms can be producers, consumers, or decomposers.
An organism’s trophic level is measured by the number of steps it is away from a primary producer (autotroph)
Producer / Autotroph - organisms that carry out photosynthesis (make their own food/energy)
Consumer / Heterotroph - organisms that cannot make their own energy (food) so they eat other organisms
Herbivores – eat only plants to obtain energy
Carnivores – eat only animals to obtain energy
Predators – hunt and kill other animals
Scavengers - feed on the bodies of dead organisms
Omnivores – eat both plants and animals to obtain energy
Decomposers - organisms that break down waste materials and dead organisms and return important nutrients to the environment
Food Chain: The transfer of energy from sun to producer to primary consumer to secondary consumer to tertiary consumer can be shown in a food chain.
Food Web: Healthy, well-balanced ecosystems are made up of multiple, interacting food chains
An ecosystem is all the living (biotic) and nonliving (abiotic) things that interact in an area
The number of individuals that can obtain food, shelter, and water from the environment in a given period of time is the carrying capacity.
Limiting Factors are things that prevent a population from growing any larger
examples: food, water, light, living space, temperature, competition, disease, etc.
There are three major types of interactions among organisms in ecosystems:
Competition
Predation
Symbiosis
Competition occurs between organisms when they try to make use of the same limited resources
Competition can occur between:members of the same species and among species with similar niches
Niche - an organism’s particular role, or how it fits into an ecosystem
Resource partitioning - helps competing species share a resource and develop a niche for themselves in an ecosystem. To partition, they mayfeed at different times of day or at different levels of the same tree.
Predation is an interaction in which one organism hunts and kills another organism for food.
organism that does the killing is the predator and organism that is hunted is the prey
Note how each population responds to the other (ex. what happens to prey population when predator population rises? vice versa?)
Symbiosis is a close relationship between two different species in which at least one species benefits.
There are three types of symbiotic relationships:
Mutualism
Commensalism
Parasitism
Commensalism: One species benefits (+) and the other is unaffected (0) Commensalism means “at the table together”
Mutualism: Both species benefit
Parasitism: One organism benefits (+) at the expense of another organism (-) which is harmed Host – the organism that the parasite lives on or in (it will be harmed) Parasite – the organism that benefits
Short- and Long-Term Environmental Changes: Changes in the environment can affect the survival of individual organisms and entire species
Individual organisms live or die according to their inherited adaptations
Extinction occurs when species are unable to adapt to environmental changes
Adaptations – structures or behaviors that increase an organism’s ability to survive in a given environment
Individual organisms live or die; only species (populations) adapt
Darwin thought that the species gradually changed over many generations and became better adapted to the new environment
This change in species over time is called evolution
Competition: The members of a species must compete with each other to survive
Natural Selection: The process by which individuals that are better adapted to their environment are more likely to survive and reproduce than other members of the same species
Overproduction: Most species produce far more offspring than can possibly survive
Variation: Any difference between individuals of the same species
Selection: Darwin proposed that over a period of time, natural selection can lead to change Helpful variations gradually accumulate in a species, while unfavorable ones disappear A change in environmental conditions can affect an organism’s ability to survive, and therefore lead to selection Survival determines if a trait is favorable
examples: food, water, light, living space, temperature, competition, disease, etc.
Ecology - the study of all the living and nonliving components within an ecosystem
Organisms can be producers, consumers, or decomposers.
An organism’s trophic level is measured by the number of steps it is away from a primary producer (autotroph)
Producer / Autotroph - organisms that carry out photosynthesis (make their own food/energy)
Consumer / Heterotroph - organisms that cannot make their own energy (food) so they eat other organisms
Herbivores – eat only plants to obtain energy
Carnivores – eat only animals to obtain energy
Predators – hunt and kill other animals
Scavengers - feed on the bodies of dead organisms
Omnivores – eat both plants and animals to obtain energy
Decomposers - organisms that break down waste materials and dead organisms and return important nutrients to the environment
Food Chain: The transfer of energy from sun to producer to primary consumer to secondary consumer to tertiary consumer can be shown in a food chain.
Food Web: Healthy, well-balanced ecosystems are made up of multiple, interacting food chains
An ecosystem is all the living (biotic) and nonliving (abiotic) things that interact in an area
The number of individuals that can obtain food, shelter, and water from the environment in a given period of time is the carrying capacity.
Limiting Factors are things that prevent a population from growing any larger
examples: food, water, light, living space, temperature, competition, disease, etc.
There are three major types of interactions among organisms in ecosystems:
Competition
Predation
Symbiosis
Competition occurs between organisms when they try to make use of the same limited resources
Competition can occur between:members of the same species and among species with similar niches
Niche - an organism’s particular role, or how it fits into an ecosystem
Resource partitioning - helps competing species share a resource and develop a niche for themselves in an ecosystem. To partition, they mayfeed at different times of day or at different levels of the same tree.
Predation is an interaction in which one organism hunts and kills another organism for food.
organism that does the killing is the predator and organism that is hunted is the prey
Note how each population responds to the other (ex. what happens to prey population when predator population rises? vice versa?)
Symbiosis is a close relationship between two different species in which at least one species benefits.
There are three types of symbiotic relationships:
Mutualism
Commensalism
Parasitism
Commensalism: One species benefits (+) and the other is unaffected (0) Commensalism means “at the table together”
Mutualism: Both species benefit
Parasitism: One organism benefits (+) at the expense of another organism (-) which is harmed Host – the organism that the parasite lives on or in (it will be harmed) Parasite – the organism that benefits
Short- and Long-Term Environmental Changes: Changes in the environment can affect the survival of individual organisms and entire species
Individual organisms live or die according to their inherited adaptations
Extinction occurs when species are unable to adapt to environmental changes
Adaptations – structures or behaviors that increase an organism’s ability to survive in a given environment
Individual organisms live or die; only species (populations) adapt
Darwin thought that the species gradually changed over many generations and became better adapted to the new environment
This change in species over time is called evolution
Competition: The members of a species must compete with each other to survive
Natural Selection: The process by which individuals that are better adapted to their environment are more likely to survive and reproduce than other members of the same species
Overproduction: Most species produce far more offspring than can possibly survive
Variation: Any difference between individuals of the same species
Selection: Darwin proposed that over a period of time, natural selection can lead to change Helpful variations gradually accumulate in a species, while unfavorable ones disappear A change in environmental conditions can affect an organism’s ability to survive, and therefore lead to selection Survival determines if a trait is favorable