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49 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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What are the resources used by plants during photosynthesis? |
Energy, water, carbon, nutrients |
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Where does energy go in respiration? |
It becomes heat and the carbon goes back to the atmosphere |
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what is Net Primary Productivity? |
Amount of energy (and carbon uptake) plants capture in photosynthesis -Amount they use in their own plant lives - stuff left over is stored in the plant -Photosynthesis - plant respiration (or: Gross primary productivity - plant respiration) -plants are producers |
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What is net ecosystem productivity |
The total amount of organic carbon in an ecosystem available for storage, export as organic carbon, or nonbiological oxidation to carbon dioxide through fire or UV oxidation -NPP - animal respiration + decomposers |
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What is Net biome productivity? |
The net production of organic matter in a region containing a range of ecosystems and leads to loss of of living and dead organic matter -NEP - other losses -Fire, erosion |
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what is water use efficiency? |
The ratio of water used in plant metabolism to water lost by the plant through transpiration -WUE=+CO2/-H20 -In deserts water use efficiency is the most important, in tropical rainforests its the least important |
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How does energy move through a food web and up a trophic pyramid? |
Energy moves through a food web through an organism digesting another organism on the trophic level below it - the first level consists of producers which of course gain their energy from the sun via photosynthesis -Energy decreases as it moves up trophic levels because energy is lost as metabolic heat when the organisms from one trophic level are consumed by organisms from the next level -animals that eat plants are primary consumers |
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what are the Global Patterns of NPP? |
Tropical rainforests are highest - places that are both wet and warm that have the most resources (energy and water) are highest -Desert and tundra are lowest |
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What are the roles of NPP, NEP, and NBP in the carbon cycle? |
Carbon going from one level to another with some going into the atmosphere at each level -From atmosphere to plants - then to animals/soil - and then repeat - but some goes to the atmosphere each time |
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What do satellites record that can be related to photosynthesis? |
Can see actual greenness or difference in radiation absorbed - then can get a measure of leaf area and how much vegetation there is |
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What major geographical gradients exist in the resources for photosynthesis? |
Temporal gradience - time and succession (more differences) + Spatial gradiance - area and isolation + Resource gradiance - precipitation and energy (climate) - main thing |
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What kinds of leaves show adaptations along these gradients: Model 1 |
Needle leaf evergreen, broadleaf dedicious, and broadleaf evergreen |
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What kinds of leaves show adaptations along these gradients: Model 2 |
evergreen scrubby, evergreen scherophyl, coastal sage scrub: drought dedicious, and desert: succulent |
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At which end of the resource gradient is plant structure limited by the resource? |
Northern limit - latitude (survival) Dry limit - survival |
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At which end of the resource gradient is plant structure limited by competition |
southern limit - latitude (competition) wet limit - competition |
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What are the three most general niche axes or dimensions that plant species can divide up? |
Climate - resources, time, and space |
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What is the difference between primary and secondary succession? |
Primary → no previous biological remnant: freshly cooled lava --Secondary → Forest fire burns down a forestPlenty of seeds, carbon in soil, and bacteria in soil, will start with small plants but eventually come back |
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What effect does disturbance have on diversity? |
People cutting down some trees - increases diversity, Elephants knocking down trees - increases, Complete deforestation - decreases diversity, and Just have corn in iowa - decreases diversity |
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How does isolation affect which species are found in a place? |
Some species can’t get to really isolated species because they do not have the means of locomotion or to be carried to the isolated species - Some species need large area to maintain a population - isolated areas are small in size |
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How would you expect vegetation to respond to climate change? |
If the climate gets warmer - things will move north, Actual productivity changes, Disturbances can change |
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What is the role of fire globally? |
Expands grasslands but to some extent it maintains diversity but not by themself - Tall grass doesn’t decompose well so thats why they burn grass every year |
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Could fire be affected by climate change? |
yes - if it gets hotter and drier - more likely to have fires |
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Tropical forest climate - High energy and water |
Resource gradiance Most productive, good competitors Temporal gradiance: Local + small scale disturbances - individual tree falls - people harvesting a few trees - competition for light |
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Tropical Forest Climate – Soils - oxisols, nutrient recycling (fungi) |
Amoeba like slime - feed on rotting vegetationFunghi recycle nutrients straight back into the trees because of their roots tied to ground Without fungi rainforests couldn’t existEverything moves up above ground really fast (grasslands - carbon is stored mainly underground) |
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Tropical rainforest climate: Resources - highest NPP |
lots of rain - energy + water and so lots of resources |
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Tropical rainforest climate: Disturbance – treefall, succession |
The death of a giant tree initiates local succession and keeps a rainforest healthy - Seeds of hard wood - trunk of a tree are quick to germinate - grow plants off the fallen trunk - plants compete for the new sunlight -Sunlight is the resource species compete for during succession |
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General: why are the tropical raiforests the most diverse? |
Soils are oxisols - not very productive soils but the dead materials recylce through funghi - shallow roots - no carbon stored in the roots - so all carbon is stored above ground |
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SW China: Geology – isolation of valleys |
Leads to spacial factor of isolations - platetectonics have crumpled up to create the deep valleys and leads to diversity (resources + space) a -Way valleys are oriented you get a very unusual climate - driven by monsoon and get tropical rainforest up north where you shouldn’t normally see it |
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SW China: Climate – tropical monsoon |
Summer - wet Winter - dry |
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SW China: Disturbance – elephants, people |
Elephants - bring light to the forest floor - take sapling, twigs, and branches with little care - major impact on their home - really only can survive in the yuunan forest -People - bring space light and diversity - people cut down trees - new sunlight - like having a big single treefall in the tropical Forest |
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SW China: Isolation – endemic species |
Isolation from competitors Unique to this geographic location - only found there Species living nowhere else |
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SW China: General: what are biodiversity hotspots? |
High diversity + high threat (destruction) |
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Grasslands: geology - plains |
Rocky mountains leave the grasslands nice and dry because of the rainshadow created |
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Grasslands: climate - rain shadows, no trees |
has some trees more than desert but way less than forest |
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Grasslands: resource gradient |
Forest - grassland - desert On desert end - grassland is limited by being to dry On forest land - limited by competition from treesFire keeps out trees from the area |
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Grasslands: Time - fire + grazing |
Keep one specie from being dominant over the other |
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Grasslands: Soils – mollisols, deep roots, high C storage (<boreal) |
Grasses grow from their bases so if they burn they can grow really fast Deep root system and a lot of carbon goes into the roots and soil so that’s why we have such fertile soil in the midwest Grasslands vs. tropical rainforests: Biomass is below ground |
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Grasslands: Disturbance – fire and grazing combo: diversity |
Grasslands grow further east where forests could grow because there is enough precipitation but the grasslands burn - so by being flammable they kill off their competitors Grasses have a nutritious base to them so they can feed mass herds - buffalo, cows, wildbeasts |
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Grasslands: what is special about grass? |
grasses grow from their bases so if they burn they can grow really fast |
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Grasslands: General: what are ecosystem services? |
Air, water, infiltration, food, NEP/BEP |
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East Africa - savanna |
80% of Kenya is over graced and over fed - less infiltration, more overland flow, more erosion - cant provide ecosystem services Exceptionally dry b/c of Himalayan mountains - casts giant rain shadow that leaves tibet high and dry Fire continent - as healthy green vegetation dies, fire moves north to south and south to north - on either side of the tropics - dry + warm (savanna) |
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Galapagos: geological hotspot |
sequence of islands - moving across a hot spot |
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galapgos: primary succession then retrogression |
when you build up in biodiversty and then retrogression occurs - Lands are going back to what they used to be - islands are getting wore down - fewer resources and less live - go almost back to bare lava Once the islands start wearing down they start going opposite to the usual course of succession |
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Resources - climate - el nino - galapagos |
Resources - differences in resources among the islands because of which ocean current has influenced them -Differences in resources that go along with the successional stageMiddle islands have the most resources |
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Galapagos: change in space - isolation - endemic species |
tortoises - islands were isolated - different species doing different things on different islands -they're isolated from every where else from the world as a group and further isolated on the groups of islands |
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Galapagos: change in space: invasive species |
quinine invasion, blackberry invasion, guava invasion |
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Galapagos - General: resources and isolation change in time |
geology, succession - primary but also connected to resources |
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How are lithosphere, atmosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere linked? |
Galapagos - hot spots lead to more islands, succession and diversity -Grasslands - rain shadows change climate lead to different kinds of vegetation and soils -Sw china - hotspot - plate tectonics lead to very deep valleys - isolation unusual climate - different species |
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What tools allow us to link many factors together as a system? |
computer simulations and satellites |
