Building ecological concepts
• Something that you can´t explain in your own
words is unknown
• Here is a list of concepts that you will need for
the next class in biology
Clearing our mind
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Ecology
Ecosystem
Habitat
Niche
Community
Population
Abiotic
Biotic
Interaction
Relationship
Three steeps
First: write your
ideas about each
one
Don´t worry about
making mistakes
Second: Look in the
dictionary or use an
internet source
Last step
Write in your own
words a new phrase
(no copy paste) that
gives a clear idea
about each concept
Concept
Ecology:
The scientific study of the distribution, abundance and dynamics of organisms, their
interactions with other organisms and with their physical environment.
Source: http://www.britishecologicalsociety.org
Ecosystem:
All organisms and the abiotic environment found in a defined spatial area. For an
ecosystem to be a useful unit of biological organisation, it is generally assumed to be
the collective description of a community and its physical environment. –
Source http://www.britishecologicalsociety.org/about-ecology/key-concepts-inecology/#sthash.hBXHynM2.dpuf
Habitat:
Refers to the kind of place where an organism normally lives. It includes the
arrangement of food, water, shelter and space that is suitable to meet an organism's
needs. You can think of this as the "address" where an organism lives.
Habitat is the place a plant or animal lives in
Source http://www.nmnaturalhistory.org/BEG/EcoConcepts_IV_SBEC.html
Concept
Niche:
Is the "occupation" of an organism. It defines the role of an organism in an ecosystem
It includes the adaptations and strategies a species uses in it’s environment.
The sum total of all the resources used by, and the biotic and abiotic conditions suffered by, a species.
Each resource (e.g. food, shelter) and condition (e.g. temperature, exposure) forms an axis of a multidimensional ‘hypervolume’ that describes the ecological requirements and constraints that allow a
species to maintain long-term average population growth. An important distinction exists between a
species’ fundamental niche (where it could persist) and its realised niche (where it does persist). –
See more at: http://www.britishecologicalsociety.org/about-ecology/key-concepts-inecology/#sthash.7afe8gLb.dpuf
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Community:
All species in a defined spatial area or ecosystem, which interact via trophic, competitive,
commensal, amensal or mutualistic interactions. Members of a community may interact directly, or
indirectly (e.g. apparent competition) if they share interaction links to other species in the
community. There is some debate regarding the true scale at which a ‘community’ can be defined
as an independent unit of organisation, with no interaction links outside its boundaries. A common
obfuscation is to define a ‘sub-community’ (an arbitrarily chosen set of species that are part of a
wider community) as a ‘community’ associated with a key species (e.g. the herbivore ‘community’
associated with a certain plant species). – See more at:
http://www.britishecologicalsociety.org/about-ecology/key-concepts-inecology/#sthash.7afe8gLb.dpuf
Concept
Population
A population is all of the individuals of the same species within an ecological community. Ecologists are interested in
the growth of a population, fluctuations in population size, the spread of the population, and any other interactions
within the population or between it and other populations.
http://education-portal.com/academy/lesson/population-ecology-definition-theory-model.html#lesson
A population is a subset of individuals of one species that occupies a particular geographic area and, in sexually
reproducing species, interbreeds.
http://global.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/470416/population-ecology
Abiotic factorsThere are the nonliving parts of an organism’s environment. Examples include air currents, temperature, moisture,
light, and soil. Abiotic factors affect an organism’s life
Interaction
competition (biotic interaction)
competition biotic interaction in ecology, utilization of the same resources by organisms of the same or of different
species living together in a community, when the resources are not sufficient.
http://global.britannica.com/search?query=interactions+in+ecology
Some types of interaction in ecology
Competition, comensalism, predation, herbivorism, parasitism, mutualism,
Presentation
• Ecology
• And
• debate