Ecosystem Interactions
This is the study of how living organisms interact with each other and with their surroundings.
What is ecology?
This is a calculation of the total land and water area needed to supply all the materials and energy a person uses, as well as absorb their waste.
What is an ecological footprint?
This planet-wide cycle includes processes like evaporation, condensation, transpiration, run-off, and precipitation.
What is the water cycle?
A species that completely ceases to exist anywhere on the entire planet is given this status.
What is extinct?
This eco-friendly method manages pest populations by introducing their natural biological enemies rather than spraying chemicals.
What is biological control?
Organisms have special characteristics that help them survive, such as a bear's claws for digging or a fish's fins for swimming. What are these called?
What are adaptations?
While food and water are basic resources needed to survive, items like cell phones and televisions fall into this category.
What are wants?
This is the specific niche of organisms that capture raw sunlight to make their very own food energy.
What are producers?
This term describes a species that has completely disappeared from one specific geographic region (like the swift fox on the Canadian prairies) but still lives elsewhere.
What is extirpated?
This is the name given to the starting information gathered by scientists to use as a point of comparison for future environmental changes.
What is baseline data?
This specific type of symbiotic relationship occurs when one organism benefits from an interaction, while the other organism is completely unaffected.
What is commensalism?
List a direct actions a person can take in their daily life to reduce their overall ecological footprint.
What are reducing energy use, reducing products bought, and practicing Reduce-Reuse-Recycle? Other reasonable answers?
This process occurs when a single organism absorbs a pollutant, causing the concentration of toxins inside its body to increase over time.
What is bioaccumulation?
This type of gradual ecological growth occurs in an area that was previously completely bare of life, such as rock left behind by a volcano or glacier.
What is primary succession?
Because they are highly sensitive to environmental changes, organisms like frogs are classified as this type of species to show the health of an ecosystem
What is an indicator species?
Name the four basic needs that every single living organism requires to survive.
What are food, water, a suitable habitat, and an exchange of gases?
Describe how human shelter interactions with the environment have shifted from historical times to modern day.
What is changing from tipis and sod houses to wood frame houses and apartment buildings? Other answers?
This is the term for the increasing concentration of toxins found in organisms as you move higher and higher up the food chain.
What is biomagnification?
State the main reason why introduced or exotic species often reproduce out of control and crowd out the basic needs of native wildlife.
What is because they do not have a natural predator in their new habitat?
This is a mandatory report that outlines exactly how a major project or development will affect the surrounding ecosystem before it can be approved.
What is an Environmental Impact Assessment?
Give one example of a non-human organism changing its environment to meet its needs, and state a negative impact this change has on a neighboring species.
What is a beaver building a dam? (This helps the beaver but can negatively impact fish). Other reasonable answers?
Explain a consequence resulting from total fire suppression.
What is Fuel Accumulation, High Intensity Fires, and/or Diversity Loss?
In the carbon cycle, name the biological process that removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
What is photosynthesis?
These are the first organisms to establish themselves after a major ecological disturbance or the establishment of new bare land.
What are pioneer species?
This type of environmental monitoring used to check the quality of air, soil, and water.
What is chemical monitoring?