Ecology Flashcards
What is ecology?
Study of living organisms, their interactions with eachother and their abiotic environment
What is the environment?
External factors that influence an organism
What is the biosphere and what does it include?
Part of the earth inhabited by living organisms
What is an ecosystem?
It’s a community of organisms and their abiotic environment
What is the relation between the biosphere and ecosystems?
Biosphere consists of many large ecosystems
Give an example of an ecosystem and a feature and a location
Desert, Low rainfall, Sahara desert
Hedgerow, Warm summer, plentiful rain, Ireland
Marine, salt water, oceans
What is a habitat?
Is the place where an organism lives and to which it is adapted
What does the study of a local habitat give us?
Representation of how ecosystem works
What is a population?
Group of individuals of the same species living and breeding in the same habitat
What is a community?
Population of different species living and interacting with each other in the same habitat
What are abiotic factors?
Non living factors
Example and effect of abiotic factor
Aspect - direction surface faces North facing - cooler South facing - warmer More plants grow on south facing Altitude - height above sea level Higher - cooler, wetter, windier Trees cannot live here
What are biotic factors?
Living factors
Give examples and effects of biotic factors
Food - more food available, greater number. Number of berries affects number of blackbirds
Competition - right for scarce resources such as food, space, mates
Rabbits compete with eachother for food
Predation - reduce numbers of prey, foxes and rabbits
Humans - positive or negative affect
Positive - new parks form new environment
Negative - pollution
What are climatic factors and give examples
Refer to weather over a long period of time
Temperature - affects rate of reactions in living things,
Higher - rapid plant growth
Lower - hibernation
Rainfall - water is essential for life, tropical rain forests high and regular rainfall
Light intensity - affects rate of photosynthesis, trees grow tall to get more light
What are edaphic factors and give examples
Relate to soil
Soil PH - adapted to specific PH values
Acid soils - bogs
Neutral soils - most plants
Alkaline soils -bee orchid
Water content - absorbed by roots and are needed by plants for transpiration and photosynthesis
Air content - provides oxygen - lack of oxygen in soil prevents organism growth
Why is temperature not important in an aquatic environment?
It doesn’t vary so rapidly
Special factors in aquatic environments
Light - water can enter free which means plants are limited to upper layers of water
Currents - cause plants to be carried away, animals are adapted
Wave action - waves create currents and also cause damage to organisms. Animals are protected by shells
Salt content - organisms are adapted to either fresh water or salt water, if external solution is unsustainable, they have problems with osmoregulation
Oxygen concentration - it’s lower in water than in air, must be able to extract oxygen for water [gills]
What are producers and give an example
They are organisms that makes its own food
plant
Where is energy stored in plants?
Chemical bonds in eg, Glucose and starch
What percentage of energy is passed on to other organism?
10%
What are consumers
Organisms that take in food from another organism
What are primary consumers?
feed on producers [include herbivores and decomposers]
What are secondary consumers?
Animals that feed on primary consumers
[carnivores and scavengers]
What are scavengers?
Feed on animals killed by other sources
What are tertiary consumers?
They feed on secondary consumers and no other organism feeds on them.
What is a food chain?
It’s a sequence of organisms in which one is eaten by the next member in the chain
What is a detritus food chain?
Where the chain begins with dead organic matter
Give an example of a detritus food chain
Fallen leaves - earthworms - blackbird - hawk
Grassland example of food chain
Buttercup - Caterpillar - blackbird - Fox
Producer - primary consumer - secondary consumer - tertiary consumer
What is a trophic level?
Position of a species in a food chain
Trophic level
Producers - 1st trophic level
Primary consumers - 2nd trophic level
What can take food from each trophic level?
Scavengers, decomposers or detritus feeders
Where does energy go?
10% passed on to next trophic level, 90% is lost in waste and heat loss
What limits the length of the food chain?
Amount of energy passing along a food chain decreases from one trophic level to the next
What is a food web?
It consists of two or more interlinked food chains
[show flow of energy]
What is a pyramid of numbers
Diagram that represents the number of organisms at each trophic level in a food chain
Why does great pyramid invert as you go up?
Due to high energy loss at each trophic level and the fact that organisms usually increase in size the further up the food chain
What is a niche?
It’s the functional role an organism plays in an ecosystem
What does an organisms niche include?
What it eats, what it is eaten by and how it interacts with other organisms and abiotic environment
Why can’t two species with identical niches survive long in same habitat?
They would both compete in some way Eg, swallows, thrushes and blackbirds Occupy different niches Swallow - aerial insects Thrush - ground insects Blackbirds - insects from trees but mostly fruit and worms
What is nutrient recycling?
It’s the way in which elements are exchanged between living and non living components of an ecosystem
Roles of organisms in the carbon cycle
Plants
Animals
Micro-organisms
Role of plants in carbon cycle
Remove carbon from environment in photosynthesis and return it in respiration
Role of animals in carbon cycle
Obtain carbon by eating plants and release carbon in respiration
Role of micro organisms in carbon cycle?
Return carbon to the environment when they decompose dead plants and animals
What is global warming?
Caused by Concentration of carbon dioxide in atmosphere rising dude to increased combustion of fossil fuels and deforestation
Carbon dioxide is a green house gas. What does this mean
It allows heat radiation from the sun to pass into earths atmosphere, but does not allow reflected heat rays back out
Effects of global warming
Sea levels may rise due to ice melting and expansion of hot water = flooding
Weather patterns may alter = affect wildlife and agriculture
What is the function of the nitrogen cycle?
Take nitrogen from the air and make it available for use by living things
Why do living things need nitrogen?
To make proteins, DNA, RNA
Features of nitrogen cycle
- Nitrogen from atmosphere can’t be used
- Nitrogen fixation
- Decomposition
- Nitrification
- Denitrification
What is nitrogen fixation and what kind of process is it?
Conversion of nitrogen gas into ammonia, ammonium or nitrate
Anaerobic process
What occurs in decomposition?
Release ammonia into the soil
What is Nitrification?
Conversion of ammonia and ammonium compounds to nitrite and then to nitrate Some of nitrate is absorbed
Denitrification
Conversion of nitrates to nitrogen gas
Anaerobic
Role of bacteria in nitrogen cycle
Nitrogen fixing bacteria
Bacteria of decay
Nitrifying bacteria
Denitrifying bacteria
Role of fungi in nitrogen cycle
Fungi of decay
Role of plants in nitrogen cycle
Absorb nitrates from soil and use nitrogen to from proteins
Role of animals in nitrogen cycle
Consume plants and use their nitrogen to form animal protein
Two biological similarities between nitrogen cycle and carbon cycle
1) depended on both animals and plants
2) decaying micro organisms present in both
What is pollution?
Any harmful edition to the environment
How does pollution arise?
Human activity - dumping, littering
What are pollutants?
Substances that cause pollution
State an effect of a named pollutant
Pollutant - Disposal of slurry
Effect - Eutrophication [excess plant growth in lakes due to extra nutrients in slurry]
Area of effect for slurry
Rivers and lakes
What is the impact of slurry
Eutrophication - excess plant growth in lakes caused by extra nutrients in slurry.
When algae die, they are decomposed by bacteria and the bacteria use up oxygen in respiration that kills animals that live in lake
How to control it
Only spread slurry when land and weather is dry to prevent the slurry running off the land and into the water
What is conservation?
Wise management of our existing natural resources
Benefits of conservation
Prevents organisms from becoming extinct
Maintains balance of nature
Organisms may be found to be useful in future
Example of conservation practice in agriculture
Only spread slurry weather is dry = prevent eutrophication
Waste management
Eutrophication slurry
Problem associated with waste disposal of slurry
Nutrients = death
Problem with landfill
Attracts rats and gulls and can be smelly
Importance of waste minimalisation
Landfills are running out of space
Need to conserve limited resources
What is the solution of waste production?
Reduce - reduce consumption of goods not needed
reuse - glass bottles
recycle - recycled paper
Role of micro organisms
What is the importance of nutrients recycled in nature?
So can be reused by other organisms
Mention one role of animals, other than consumers, in the nitrogen cycle
Excrete nitrogen compounds
Name the family of plants which have a symbotic relationship with nitrogen fixing bacteria
Legumes
What is the role of modern fertilisers in the nitrogen cycle
Supply nitrate
TROPHIC LEVEL
A->B>C->D
Which letter represents the secondary consumer?
C
TROPHIC LEVEL
A->B>C->D
Give a possible reason why the population of C may decline naturally
Disease
Lack of food
Migration
Increase of D
TROPHIC LEVEL
A->B>C->D
Suggest a possible consequence for the population of A if the population of C was significantly reduced
Fall - B would increase and eat large amount of A
TROPHIC LEVEL
A->B>C->D
Suggest how members of species D might respond, if population C was reduced
Migrate
A food web is a series of interconnected food chains. Suggest how it may be possible for the secondary consumer to be a primary consumer in another food chain
Omnivore
What percentage of light is used to make food in plants
1%
What’s a herbivore and give an example
An animal which eats plants only eg, rabbit
What’s a carnivore and give an example
An animal which eats meat only eg, fox
What’s an omnivore and give an example
An animal which eats both plant and animals eg, blackbird
Why are pyramid of numbers limited?
The size of organisms can change the standard shape or it may not be possible to represent large number of organisms correctly
Name the process that takes place in plants to which energy is converted to a usable form
Photosynthesis
What substance do plants possess that allows them to carry out this conversion
Chlorophyll in chloroplasts
Give an example of a food web
Hawk
Blackbird
Caterpillar Slug
Dock leaves
Describe three benefits of practising conservation
Prevents extinction of species
Decreases pollution
Maintains biodiversity
Preserves habitats
A new waste-to-energy incinerator is currently being built in poolbeg, dublin which will generate energy from domestic waste that cannot be reused or recycled
Suggest two reasons why this new incinerator is located in Dublin
It has a large population and therefore has
A lot of waste
High demand for energy
Give one advantage and one disadvantage of incineration in waste disposal
Advantage - amount of waste reduced
Disadvantage - harmful products produced
What is the main role of micro-organisms in waste disposal?
Decomposes
Explain what Fauna and flora is in ecology
Fauna - Animals
Flora - Plants
Using your knowledge of ecology, suggest why caution is advised regarding the release of non-native animals into the Irish countryside
Can become pests
Can spread disease
Using your knowledge of ecology, suggest why caution is advised regarding using fishing nets of very small mesh size
Reduced reproduction rates as young fish are trapped
Using your knowledge of ecology, suggest why caution is advised regarding hedgerow cutting in spring and summer
Disrupts nesting and endangers animals
Where in a food chain are primary producers found?
First trophic level
What term is used to describe organisms that feed on primary producers?
Primary consumers / herbivores
Why are most food chains short?
Only small amount of energy passed
What deduction may be made if the organisms at the start of the chain are less numerous than those that feed upon them
They are large
Parasites are the primary consumers
Can a parasite be the first member of a food chain and explain your answer
No, they are not producers. They are consumers
Energy enters food chains in the form of light. In which from is most energy lost from food chains
Heat
State one benefit of a plant gong off strong smells
Repulsion/ Attraction
Suggest why continual monitoring of the environment is valuable
To be able to detect changes and remedy effect of change
Distinguish between edaphic and aquatic
Edaphic -to do with soil
Aquatic - to do with water
Distinguish between climate and weather
Climate is long term prevailing conditions
Weather is short term atmospheric conditions
Suggest a reason why nature reserves are important for conservation
Allow species to develop
Prevent extinction
Distinguish between a food chain and a food web
Food chain - sequence of organisms where the organism is eaten by the next one and there is only one species per trophic level
Food web - interlinked food chains where there is more than one species per trophic level
Suggest a reason for attempting to establish an exotic species in a new country
Biological control
Good source
Suggest two reasons why the great majority of attempted introductions have been unsuccessful
Failure to adapt
Prayed upon
Competition
Use your knowledge of the life cycle of flowering plants to suggest how an exotic plant may escape from captivity
Seed dispersal
Suggest how the introduction of an exotic species may have a negative impact on an existing community
Competition
Predation
Suggest how the introduction of an exotic species may have a positive impact on an existing community
Control of nuisance species
Food
Do herbivores in an ecosystem normally live long lives?
No, they are eaten by secondary consumer
Why is the only remaining natural ecosystems in Ireland are ones for which mankind has no use
No economic value
Suggest an advantage to the fox in being “nocturnal in habit”
Avoids competition
Enhances survival
Less visible
Give one example of the use of micro-organisms in waste management
Landfill sites
Compost heaps
Outline the problems associated with the disposal of waste
No landfills available
Incineration releases toxins
