Ch. 7 Flashcards
Chemical warfare
Some prey use poison like the oleander plant, some are irritating like the stinging nettles and bombardier beetles, some smell foul like the skunk skunk cabbage and stinkbugs, and some taste bad like the buttercup or the monarch butterfly.
Climax community
Stable community that has long-lived plants and in balance with environment
Constancy
Ability of a living system to keep within the limits imposed by available resources
Dung beetle
remove and recycle dung as a food source for newly hatched larvae. Also churn and aerate the soil for plants. Basically recycle animal wastes
Pioneer / early successional plant species
Lichen and mosses that go to a new area by the spores carried by wind or animals
Epiphytes
Plants that attach to trunks or branches of trees in tropical forests, with better access to sunlight, ex of commensalism
Facilitation
When a species modifies the environment to make it easier for other species to move in
Inertia / persistence
ability of a living system to resist being disturbed or altered
Resilience
Ability of a living system to bounce back and repair damage after a disturbance that is not too drastic
Resource partioning
When species evolve to use resources at different times places or ways
Mimicry
Act and look like other species, like the poisonous viceroy looks like a monarch
Piaster Orchaceus
Predator sea star that acts as a keystone species by preventing mussels from overcrowding
Species evenness
Abundance of individuals within each species
Species richness
Number of different species
Top predator
Keystone species that regulate the populations of other species
