Plant ecology
subjects,goals and tasks
Plant ecology subjects,objectives
• The subject of the study of ecology, therefore,
are plants, or their groups, changing under the
influence of various environmental factors.
• Objectives in ecology are divided into field,
experimental and modeling
Plant ecology interdisciplinary
connections
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Physiology;
Ecology;
Biology;
Anatomy;
Chemistry;
Physics;
History of plant ecology
• Plant ecology originated during the late nineteenth century in
Germany and Scandinavia. Early plant ecologists pursued two broad
areas of research: synecology, the study of plant communities and
autecology, the study of the adaptation of species to their
environments. Plant ecology developed rapidly in Britain and the
United States during the first decade of the twentieth century, before
animal ecology and other specialties emerged. The study of plant
communities, particularly plant succession, became the central focus
of ecological research during the first half of the twentieth century.
After Second World War, the status of plant ecology as a distinctive
area of research declined as new fields such as population ecology
and ecosystem ecology gained prominence. However, plant
ecologists continued to make substantial contributions to these
newer areas of research.
Research methods in plant ecology
Field methods are observations of the functioning of
organisms in their natural habitat.
• Experimental methods include varying the various
factors that affect organisms, according to a program
developed in a stationary laboratory environment.
• Methods of modeling allow us to predict the
development of various processes of interaction of
living systems with each other and with their
environment.
Ecological factors
• Ecological factor - the element of habitat that can have a direct
impact on the living body of at least one of the stages of individual
development.
All environmental factors are divided into biotic, abiotic and
anthropogenic.
• Biotic factors - are all possible influence that is experiencing a
living organism from the surrounding living beings.
Everybody is constantly experiencing the direct or indirect influence
of living beings come into touch with the representatives of their
own species and other species - plants, animals, microorganisms, it
depends on them and himself to influence them. For example, the
plants during photosynthesis release oxygen for breathing animals,
and animals provide entry into the atmosphere of carbon dioxide,
without which plants cannot carry out photosynthesis.
• Abiotic factors - it affects the body elements of inanimate
nature (temperature, light, humidity, composition of air, water,
soil, natural background of Radiation Earth, terrain, etc.).