B
This is a group of different species living together in one area.
Community
This is a species that has an unusually large effect on its ecosystem.
This is a major regional or global community of organisms.
biome
These are organisms that eat dead, organic matter.
These are organisms that get their energy from nonliving resources.
producers or autotrophs
The stability of a food web depends on this.
producers
These are living things or once living things in an ecosystem.
biotic factors
This is how carbon is removed from the atmosphere.
photosynthesis
Carbon exists in this form when it is in the atmosphere.
carbon dioxide (CO2)
This type of survey is a way of observing animals that are difficult to track - one must search for signs of the animal's presence, such as a recent kill.
indirect survey
These are two methods that ecologists use to estimate the size of a population.
Mark-recapture and quadrat sampling
bicarbonate (HCO3-)
This is how phosphate is returned to the soil after it has been taken up by producers/consumers.
This is how phosphate is first released into the soil.
weathering of rocks
This organism is needed to convert nitrogen in the atmosphere into forms usable by other organisms.
bacteria
This step in the nitrogen cycle is when nitrogen in the atmosphere is converted into ammonia.
nitrogen fixation
This step of the nitrogen cycle is when nitrogen in the soil is converted into nitrogen gas in the atmosphere.
denitrification
This happens to energy at each link in a food chain.
some energy is stored in the organism and some is lost to the environment
Phosphorus re-enters the nitrogen cycle in this way.
leaches into groundwater where it becomes locked in sediments - which become rock after thousands of years
This step of the nitrogen cycle is when ammonia is converted into nitrates (which is the form of nitrogen most plants can absorb).
nitrification
List the five levels of organization that ecologists study nature (start with the local scale and work to the global scale)
organism --> population --> community --> ecosystem --> biome
List three ways that carbon is added to the atmosphere.
cellular respiration, burning of fossil fuels, decomposition of organisms, emissions from factories/automobiles
List the three general methods used by ecologists to study nature.
observation, experimentation, and modeling
Determine how the stability of an ecosystem would be affected if all decomposers were suddenly removed.
Vital nutrients would not be returned back to the soil - producers (plants) would not be able to produce efficiently - consumers would not have producers to eat
Determine the dangers a specialist faces that a generalist does not.
A specialist mainly eats one species of organisms. If that one species dies, then the specialist will likely also die. A generalist eats a wide variety of species, so it not affected as greatly if one of those species dies.