DEFINITIONS
The study of the interactions between living and nonliving things
What is Ecology?
The water droplet evaporates and rises, cools, condenses and forms a cloud and eventually be precipitated as rain, snow, etc. back to the Earth where it will enter a water system as surface run off, seep into the groundwater or be absorbed by plants and released again into the atmosphere through transpiration.
What is the water cycle?
The two larger biome categories have ecologists identified (they place the other biome sub categories in these two main categories)
Terrestrial (or land) & Aquatic (or water) biomes
What is an example of an invasive species in the 1920's in Australia?
Rabbits in Australia
Thomas Austin imported 24 rabbits and released them on his property in Australia. Six years later, he had more than 10,000 rabbits (even after he claimed to have killed 20,000 rabbits!) destroying his grasslands and keeping his sheep from getting the grass they needed.
What is a relationship between two organisms of different species where one benefits and the other is harmed called
Parasitism
The association of living organisms and their physical environment called
What is Ecosystem?
The process by which oxygen is removed from the air and restored to the air
The Oxygen Cycle
Organisms use the oxygen from the air as part of their respiration, human fires use up oxygen, rusting of metals uses up a percentage of oxygen, and some oxygen in the atmosphere is converted to ozone that protects the Earth from harmful rays. Luckily, oxygen is restored to the air through photosynthesis of plants on land and phytoplankton in the ocean
What type of terrestrial biome is wet and warm year-round temperatures? The rainfall is often more than 100 inches per year
Tropical Rainforest
The Austrailian government tried to eliminate their rabbit problems in the early, 1900s by introducing this which did eventually kill off the rabbits by way of helpful mosquitos
What is a virus?
The organisms use carbon dioxide and produce oxygen via photosynthesis as they make food for themselves (glucose)
What is Producers (phytoplankton & plants) 🌱?
The measure of the total amount of living tissue of organisms within a trophic level in an ecosystem
What is Biomass?
The process where atmospheric nitrogen is used by plants, animals and nitrogen-fixing bacteria to bring Nitrogen in the atmosphere into the food chain
What is the Nitrogen Cycle?
The process where atmospheric nitrogen is used by plants and animals (it is an essential part of amino acids, DNA, and RNA). Nitrogen-fixing bacteria living in soil add hydrogen to the nitrogen changing it from N2 to NH3 so that many plants can use the nitrogen/ammonia. Other nitrifying bacteria break down ammonia into nitrates/nitrites. Primary consumers (animals) eat the plants getting their nitrogen from plants. Carnivores eat animals that have eaten the plants to get their nitrogen. Some of the nitrogen is excreted the rest is broken down back into the soil by decomposers after it dies!
These are classified mainly by climate, which includes the abiotic factors- temperature range and precipitation level.
What are biomes?
Humans burned this in much higher quantities during and after the industrial revolution
What are fossil fuels?
These are is found anywhere the ocean meets fresh water
What are Estuaries?
The process by which certain gasses (principally water vapor, carbon dioxide, and methane) trap heat that would otherwise escape Earth and radiate into space
What is the Greenhouse effect?
The process through which Phosphorus is released from eroding rocks by water and is carried to lakes, streams, rivers, and oceans where it combines with oxygen to form phosphates and enters the food chain.
What is the Phosphorus Cycle?
Phosphorus is found in rocks and is released through weathering and erosion. As the rocks erode, water dissolves the phosphorus and carries it to lakes, streams, rivers, and oceans. Once in water, the phosphorous combines with oxygen to form phosphates. Just like in the carbon and nitrogen cycles, phosphorus is passed through the food chain (it is returned through animal waste and decay).
What is a subarctic biome with below-freezing temperatures for six months of the year? (Not many plant specifies grow in the tiaga, conifer/evergreen trees are the dominant plant life. Rabbits, squirrels, lynx, and bobcats are some of the animals that live in this biome.) p. 115
Taiga or Boreal Forest
Some ways scientists know what the climate was like before the 1800s when modern records were kept
What is historic evidence or written histories of the times by Plato, Aristotle, and Roman scribes, evidence found in ice cores, sediment samples of the ocean and lake floors, tree growth rings, and fossilized pollen analysis
What the topmost layer of water nearest the shore is called
What is the Littoral Zone?
A relationship between two or more organisms of a different species where ALL benefit from the association called
What is Mutualism?
Adding too much of this to water from fertilizer and animal manure can cause algae to grow faster than the ecosystem can handle.
What is phosphorus?
The overabundance of algae uses more oxygen in the water robbing the other marine life of oxygen they need.
Also remember that picking up animal waste, being careful not to over-fertilize plants, and using phosphate-free soaps and cleaning products can help stop phosphorus from entering drainage systems.
Aquatic biomes are divided into zones based on factors such as these two things
What are water depth and the amount of sunlight available for photosynthesis?
historical examples of ecological succession
What are any of the following:
Eruption of Mount St. Helens, 1980
1988 Yellowstone National Park fire
2005 Hurricane Katrina and Rita devastating coastal wetlands of Lousiana
Also natural disturbances such as storms, floods, droughts, fires, volcanic eruptions affect communities by changing habitats and destroying organisms
An organism's role in an ecosystem, including it's habitat, physical requirements (such as light, water, food sources), the time of day it's active, its place on the food change, and when and how it reproduces.
What is a species' niche?