Community Ecology Flashcards
Define inter- interactions
interactions between different species
Define intra interactions
Interactions between the same species.
What are different community interactions
Competition, predation, symbioses.
Define Mutualism
A relationship where both species benefit
What is Commensalism
A relationship where one species benefits but the other is unharmed.
What is Parasitism
A relationship where one species benefits at the expense of the other.
How is symbiosis a specturm
Often the species on the host will be happy to cause harm when the host is weak.
What example of spectrum symbioses did we look at in classs.
A yeast on our skin that occupies the space other parasites cannot inhabit, this yeast would happily cause us harm when we are immune compromised.
What happens when there is an overlap in niches
Competition.
How does natural selection act on overlapping niches.
Natural selection will lead to specialization in a certain niche.
When a species gets out competed for a resource, the individuals that do not require that resource will be the fitter individuals.
Define Competitive Exclusion
for any given niche, one species can fill it in a geographic area.
What example did we see in class of competitive exclusion
A species of bacteria will grow fine when separate, but when grown together only one will proliferate.
What is the difference between a fundamental niche and a realized niche?
A fundamental niche is the total area that a species can exist, the realized niche is where it does exist.
What example did we see in class of a realized niche
A barnacle that can grow at many heights, but is only found at a higher level because of competition at lower heights.
Define Resource Partitioning
Competition avoidance.
What is a unique resource that birds have partitioned to avoid competition.
Sound frequencies.
Overlapping sounds would lead to competition for mates, space etc.
Define Trophic
Eating
How long is the largest known food chain
7 links.
Why are food chains relatively short?
Because an enormous amount of energy is lost at each level.
How much energy is lost with each step in the food chain.
90%
Define richness
Number of different species.
Diversity
Why is monocorp farming effective.
We can make tools that aid in farming for that specific plant.
How are plant diversity and animal diversity related.
There is a direct correlation. As plant diversity increase animal diversity increases.
What is the difference between richness and evenness
Evenness relates to the distribution of species. Richness is just the number of different species.
When there are more of each species than there is more evenness.
