Diversity within a community

Question 1

What is biodiversity?

Answer 1

The general term used to describe variety in the living world as it refers to the number and variety of living organisms in a particular area.

Question 2

What are the 3 components of biodiversity?

Answer 2

1) Species diversity - number of different species and the number of individuals of each species within any one community.
2) Genetic diversity - variety of genes possessed by individuals that make up a population of a species.
3) Ecosystem diversity - the range of different habitats, from a small local habitat to the whole Earth.

Question 3

What is species richness?

Answer 3

The measure of species diversity. This is the number of different species in a particular area at a given time.
E.g. Area A has yellow, blue, red mushrooms but 95% is yellow
Area B has yellow, blue, red mushrooms, each at 33.3%, Area B is said to have more species richness.