ecology

Question 1

Ecosystem

Answer 1

a biological community of interacting organisms and their physical environment.

Question 2

Biotic factor

Answer 2

any living component that affects another organism, or shapes the ecosystem.

Question 3

Abiotic factor

Answer 3

non-living chemical and physical parts of the environment that affect living organisms and the functioning of ecosystems.

Question 4

Organism

Answer 4

an individual animal, plant, or single-celled life form.

Question 5

Species

Answer 5

the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring,

Question 6

Population

Answer 6

In biology, a population is all the organisms of the same group or species, which live in a particular geographical area

Question 7

Community

Answer 7

a small or large social unit (a group of living things) that has something in common, such as norms, religion, values, or identity.

Question 8

Habitat

Answer 8

the natural home or environment of an animal, plant, or other organism.

Question 9

Natural Selection

Answer 9

the process whereby organisms better adapted to their environment tend to survive and produce more offspring

Question 10

Evolution

Answer 10

the process by which organisms change over time as a result of changes in heritable physical or behavioral traits.

Question 11

Producers/autotrophs

Answer 11

an organism that is able to form nutritional organic substances from simple inorganic substances such as carbon dioxide.

Question 12

Consumers/heterotrophs

Answer 12

an organism deriving its nutritional requirements from complex organic substances.

Question 13

Primary Consumer

Answer 13

Next come organisms that eat the autotrophs; these organisms are called herbivores or primary consumers – an example is a rabbit that eats grass. The next link in the chain is animals that eat herbivores

Question 14

Secondary Consumer

Answer 14

eats the animals that consume the plants. ex. wolf eats a deer

Question 15

Tertiary consumer

Answer 15

an animal that only feeds off of secondary consumers

Question 16

Herbivores

Answer 16

an animal that feeds on plants.

Question 17

Carnivores

Answer 17

an animal that feeds on flesh.

Question 18

Omnivores

Answer 18

an animal or person that eats food of both plant and animal origin.

Question 19

Decomposers

Answer 19

an organism, especially a soil bacterium, fungus, or invertebrate, that decomposes organic material.

Question 20

Food Chain

Answer 20

a hierarchical series of organisms each dependent on the next as a source of food.

Question 21

Food web

Answer 21

a system of interlocking and interdependent food chains.

Question 22

Energy pyramid

Answer 22

An ecological pyramid is a graphical representation designed to show the biomass or bio productivity at each trophic level in a given ecosystem.

Question 23

Carbon Cycle

Answer 23

the series of processes by which carbon compounds are interconverted in the environment

Question 24

Nitrogen Cycle

Answer 24

the series of processes by which nitrogen and its compounds are interconverted in the environment and in living organisms, including nitrogen fixation and decomposition

Question 25

Ecological succession

Answer 25

Ecological succession is the process of change in the species structure of an ecological community over time.

Question 26

primary succession

Answer 26

Primary succession is one of two types of biological and ecological succession of plant life, occurring in an environment in which new substrate devoid of vegetation and other organisms usually lacking soil, such as a lava flow or area left from retreated glacier, is deposited.

Question 27

Pioneer species

Answer 27

Pioneer species are hardy species which are the first to colonize previously disrupted or damaged ecosystems, beginning a chain of ecological succession that ultimately leads to a more biodiverse steady-state ecosystem.

Question 28

Climax community

Answer 28

a historic term for a biological community of plants, animals, and fungi which, through the process of ecological succession in the development of vegetation in an area over time, have reached a steady state.