Today’s Schedule
Study hall: Rooms 214, 115
1. Explain how autotrophs/producers are different from heterotrophs/consumers.
Give examples of each.
• Autotrophs/producers can
make their own food,
heterotrophs/consumers
can’t.
• Autotrophs/producers:
plants, algae, phytoplankton
• Heterotrophs/consumers:
animals
2. What is a decomposer? Give three examples.
• Eats dead things
• Bacteria, fungi, worms, slugs, sea stars
3. What is an ecosystem?
Give an example of one.
• All living and
non-living things
in a particular
place.
• Forest, desert,
coral reef, etc.
4. What is a species? Give an example of one.
• Particular kind of living thing.
• Dogs, cats, lions, tigers, humans, Douglas fir trees, etc.
5. Describe the flow of energy through the following members of an ecosystem:
decomposers, autotrophs, heterotrophs, and the sun.
• Energy goes from sun to autotrophs to heterotrophs to decomposers.
6. Explain what photosynthesis is and why it is important to all life on Earth.
• Process by which producers use light energy to make their own food.
• Photosynthesis at beginning of almost every food chain on Earth.
• Without it, plants would starve. Without plants, animals would starve.
7. Explain the difference between photosynthesis and chemosynthesis. Where on
Earth does chemosynthesis happen?
• Photosynthesis: how
organisms use light energy
to make food.
• Chemosynthesis: how
organisms use chemical
energy to make food.
• At bottom of ocean, at
hydrothermal vents.
8. Explain why each level of an ecological pyramid is smaller than the level below it.
• Every animal has to eat several
animals from level below it.
• Every animal only gets 10% of
energy from animals or plants
they eat, so have to eat a lot of
them.
9. What is biodiversity and why is it important for healthy ecosystems?
• Variety of living things in
an area.
• More variety = more
sources of food, shelter
for animals. If one
species disappears, there
are still others.
10. Give example of an invasive species in the Pacific NW and explain it is a problem.
• Himalayan blackberry.
• Grows out of control, chokes out/kills all other plants.
11. How can you tell a Douglas fir tree from a Western red cedar? How can you tell
red alder from Himalayan blackberry?
• Douglas fir has seed cones with “mouse tails”, western red cedar has scaly leaves.
• Red alder is tree with toothed, “ruffled” leaves. Blackberry is a shrub with thorns
and berries.
Red alder
Douglas fir
Himalayan blackberry
Western red cedar
12. What is ecology and why is it important to learn about?
• Study of how living things interact with
their environments.
• So we can understand how we are
affecting our environment.
• So we can understand how our
environment works.
• So we can understand how life on Earth
works.
13. Name one Pacific NW plant that can convert nitrogen from the atmosphere into a form
living things can use to make protein. How does this help other living things?
• Red alder.
• When leaves fall, they fertilize soil. Provide nitrogen for other plants and
animals to make protein.
14. Constraints are things that limit how much you can do in an experiment. Suppose you
wanted to find out how many orcas there are in Puget Sound. What would be some
constraints on your ability to come up with an accurate count?
• They’re always
moving, hard to keep
track of.
• Hard to find when
underwater.
• New ones born, old
ones dying.