biodiversity

Question 1

What is biodiversity?

Answer 1

*Variety of living organisms
*Can relate to a range of habitats, from a small local habitat to the Earth

Question 2

Whats species richness

Answer 2

measure of num of different species in a community

Question 3

What is a community?

Answer 3

*All pop of diff species
that live in an area.

Question 4

What does an index of diversity do?

Answer 4

describes the relationship between number of species in community and number of individuals in pop

Question 5

Suggest why index of diversity is more useful than species richness

Answer 5

*takes into account number of individuals in each species
*So takes into account that some species may be present in small or high numbers

Question 6

Explain how some farming techniques reduce biodiversity

Answer 6

*Removal of woodland and hedgerows *Reduces variety of plants
*Monoculture (growing one type of crop)
*use of herbicides to kill weeds
● So fewer habitats and niches
● And less variety of food source
Use of pesticides to kill pests- decrease of pests decreases predator pop

*over-grazing- animals over eaating plants, decreases biodiversity
*selective breeding- narrows gene pool- decreases genetic diversity

Question 7

Explain the balance between conservation and farming

Answer 7

Conservation required to increase biodiversity
● But when on farms, yields can be reduced, reducing income for farmers
● To offset loss, financial incentives / grants offerered

Question 8

Give examples of how biodiversity can be increased in areas of agriculture

Answer 8

● Reduce use of pesticides
● Growing different crops in the same area (intercropping)
● crop rotation of nitrogen fixing crops instead of fertlisers