Lab 1: Niche and Competition game

Question 1

What is niche breadth? What are the two classifications of species based on niche breadth?

Answer 1

The range along a resource spectrum that a given organism can occupy.
Specialists: narrow niche breadth, narrow range of the resource
Generalist: exploits a broader range of the same resource, can use many different types

Question 2

What do the different variables mean in the niche breadth equation?

Answer 2

B= niche breadth, ranges from 0-1 and the closer to one it is, the more general the species is
n= number of food types
pi= the proportion of the species diet that consists of food type i
qi= proportion of available resources made up of type i

Question 3

What is niche overlap?

Answer 3

The degree to which resource use overlaps between species.
Ranges from 0-1 where 1 represents complete niche overlap.
The more niche overlap between species, the more likely they are to compete if the resource being looked at becomes limiting

Question 4

What is competitive exclusion?

Answer 4

When two species compete for a critical resource, one species may eventually eliminate the other from the habitat where their distributions overlap

Question 5

What are the three possible outcomes of competitive exclusion?

Answer 5

1. Extinction: one species completely replaces the other species throughout the entire geographical range of that species
2. Allopatric distribution: One species eliminates the other from part of its range, resulting on non-overlapping distribution
3. Sympatric distribution: both species remain in an overlapping distribution, but the competitively superior species forces the other species to abandon use of the limited resource and replace it with an alternative

Question 6

What type of data is a Chi-square goodness of fit test used on?

Answer 6

Count data/discrete data
NO MEANS
Even if you start with count data, if you average them into means then you would use a T-test or ANOVA