Role of invertebrates in agriculture and ecosystem Flashcards
What is the role of the honeybee as pollinators?
Many plants depend on insects to pollinate their flowers and to complete their life cycle. The contribution of wild pollinators and tame honeybees is hard to distinguish. We know, though that a large number of flowers are pollinated by honeybees, there are also many flowers that can only be pollinated by specific types of wild pollinators and not by honeybees. Wild pollinators include bumblebees and other bees, butterflies and moths, flies, and a variety of other insects like beetles
Wild pollinators
bumblebees and other bees, butterflies, and moths, flies, and a variety of other insects like beetles
What is the meaning of decomposition?
The natural process where a dead animal or plant tissue breaks down takes place as a result of the feeding process of invertebrates such as fungi or bacteria
Role of decomposers
All living organisms on earth will eventually die. Dead organisms and animal waste products are food or habitat for other organisms to live on. Some dead animals will be eaten by foxes and crows. Those that are not eaten by bigger animals will decompose or be broken down in their constituent chemicals by a multitude of animals, including beetles and their larva, flies, maggots, and worms, as well as bacteria and fungi. Collectively they are known as decomposers. The lives of many of these organisms depend on the death of others.
The process of decomposition
The decomposers provide themselves with food by extracting chemicals from the dead bodies or the organic wastes, they use this to produce energy. The decomposers will then produce their own waste products. In return, this will also be decomposed and put back in the soil as nutrients. The nutrients can be taken up by the roots of living plants which enable them to grow. In reality, nothing is wasted in nature When an animal dies and decomposes, it’s only the bones that are left behind, but that will decompose just over a much longer period
