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41 Cards in this Set
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- Back
- 3rd side (hint)
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Non-living parts of an ecosystem.
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What are Abiotic Factors?
p35 |
Ex. temperature, sunlight, humidity, soil type, water supply, & mineral nutrients.
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An inherited trait that increases an organism's chance for survival & reproduction in a certain environment.
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What is Adaptation?
p46 |
Ex. Cabbage plants evolved a chemical defense & cabbage butterfly caterpillars evolved a way to break down this defense called coevolution.
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Living parts of an ecosystem
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What is Biotic Factors?
p.35. |
Ex. animals, plants, & microorganisms.
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Two/more species evolving in response to each other.
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What is Co-evolution?
p. 46. |
usually occurs between predators & prey with each evolving characteristics to protect itself from the other.
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Relationship between two species in which one specie benefits and the other is neither harmed/helped.
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What is Commensalism?
p42. |
Ex. Ramoras are fish that attach themselves to sharks and feed on scraps of food left over from the shark's meals.
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A group of interacting populations of different species.
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What is a Community?
p. 37. |
Ex. Pond community includes populations of various plants, fish, insects, amphibians, & microorganisms.
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The relationship between species that attempt to use the same limited resource.
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What is Competition?
p. 40. |
Ex. Fire ants compete with native ants for territory, plants compete for sunlight, kudzu covers native plants & pandas compete w/ humans for bamboo
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All living organisms in a certain area as well as their physical environment
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What is an Ecosystem?
p. 34. |
Ex. soil ecosystem includes a variety of organisms- earthworms, snakes, moles, insects, plants, fungi and bacteria
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Change in the genetic characteristics of a population from one generation to the next.
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What is Evolution?
p. 44. |
The process of natural selection is responsible for evolution according to Charles Darwin's Theory.
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The irreversible disappearance of a population or species.
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What is Extinction?
p. 46. |
When the last member of a species dies out.
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A place where an organism lives.
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What is a Habitat?
p. 38. |
Ex. Lion's live in a Savannah, Howler Monkey lives in a Rainforest, Cactus live in desert etc.
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Organism from which a parasite takes its nourishment.
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What is a Host?
p. 41. |
Ex. a dog is the host organism of a tick/flea, a tree is the host of mistletoe
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A relationship between two species in which both benefit.
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What is Mutualism?
p. 41. |
Ex. the relationship between you and your intestinal bacteria, the Acacia tree in Central America and ants.
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A term used to describe the unequal survival and reproduction of organisms that results from the presence or absence of particular inherited traits.
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What is Natural Selection?
p. 43. |
Darwin proposed that over many generations natural selection causes the characteristics of populations to change causing evolution in organisms.
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An organism's way of life
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What is Niche?
p. 38. |
Ex. all the lion's relationships with its environment - both the living and nonliving parts create its niche.
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An individual living thing.
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What is an Organism?
p. 37 |
It can be microscopic, one-celled or multicellular as a living thing
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An organism that lives in or on another organism and feeds on it without immediately killing it.
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What is a Parasite? p.41.
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most organisms are negatively affected by parasites making them more vulnerable to predators.
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The relationship between a parasite and its host.
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What is Parasitism? p. 41
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Ex. relationships of ticks, fleas, tapeworms, viruses, blood-sucking leeches, and mistletoe with their hosts.
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A group of individuals of the same species living in a particular place.
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What is a Population? p. 37.
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Ex. a bullfrog population ia pond or a bluebonnet population of a field or a bacterium population of a petri dish.
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The act of killing and eating another organism.
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What is Predation? p. 39.
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Ex.Lionsfeeding on Zebras, birds eating insects, snakes eating mice, etc.
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An organism that kills and eats another organism.
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What is a Predator? p. 39.
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Ex. hawks, starfish, chameleon, cougar, fox, etc.
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An organism that is killed and eaten by a predator.
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What is Prey? p. 39.
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Ex. krill to whales, deer to cougars, insects to birds, etc.
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A group of organisms that are able to produce fertile offspring and that resemble each other, in appearance, behavior, & internal structure.
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What are Species? p. 37.
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Ex. Homo sapiens = humans, Canis familiaris = tame dogs
Gorilla gorilla = all gorillas |
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Consumer that eats only other consumers.
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What is a Carnivore? p. 57.
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Flesheaters include hawks, monitor lizards, sharks, lions, etc.
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The process of breaking down food to yield energy.
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What is Cellular Respiration?
p. 57. |
Sugars and oxygen combine to form carbon dioxide, water, and energy.
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Final, Stable community that forms when lands are left undisturbed.
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What is a Climax Community?
p.67 |
Ex. a Maple forest remains a Maple forest unless some serious disturbance occurs.
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An organism that gets its energy by eating other organisms; a heterotroph
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What is a Consumer? p. 56.
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Ex. Carnivores/Omnivores.
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A consumer that gets its food by breaking down dead organisms.
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What is a Decomposer? p.57
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Ex. bacteria & fungi
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The sequence in which energy is transferred from one organism to the next as each organism eats and is then eaten by another.
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What is a Food Chain? p.59
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Ex. An Ocean food chain = algae > krill > Cod > Leopard Seal > Killer Whale
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Diagram showing feeding relationships between organisms in an ecosystem.
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What is a Food Web? p.60
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Organisms feed on more than one kind of food and ecosystems almost always have more species than those in a single food chain.
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Consumer that eats only producers.
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What is a Herbivore?
p. 57. |
Ex. Mammals such as cows, horses, sheep, etc.
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Bacteria that convert nitrogen gas from the atmosphere into a form that plants can use.
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What are Nitrogen-Fixing Bacteria? p. 64.
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bacteria that take nitrogen gas from the air and transorm it into a form that ecosystems can use.
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Consumers that eat both plants and animals.
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What is an Omnivore? p.57
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Ex. humans, bears & pigs.
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First organisms to colonize any newly available area and start the process of succession.
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What are Pioneers? p. 67.
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Ex. grasses & weeds that produce many seeds.
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Rain, sleet, hail, snow that has condensed from water vapor in the atmosphere and returns to Earth's surface.
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What is Precipitation? p. 63.
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Most important part of Water Cycle to plants and animals
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Succession that occurs in areas where no ecosystem has existed previously.
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What is Primary Succession? p. 69.
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slower process due to no soil due to glacial retreat
or volcanic eruptions. |
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An organism that makes its own ; autotroph
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What is a Producer?
p. 56. |
ex. Flora / vegetation.
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Pattern of change in an area where an ecosystem has previously existed.
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What is Secondary Succession?
p. 67. |
ex. burned areas around Mt. St. Helens.
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The regular pattern of changes over time in the types of species in a community.
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What is Succession.
p. 66 |
Ex. May take hundreds or thousands of years.
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A step in the transfer of energy through an ecosystem.
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What is Trophic Levels?
p. 60 |
Ex. transfer of energy makes less of it available to man
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The continual process by which water circulates between the atmosphere and Earth.
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What is the Water Cycle?
p. 62. |
Ex. evaporation > condesation > precipitation >
repeat. |
