ECOSYSTEMS
Definitions for Vocabulary Match Up
Name_______________________________________ Date___________
1.
organism – Any living plant or animal.
2.
environment – All the living and nonliving conditions that affect an
animal’s life including other animals, plants, climate, water, light, and air.
3.
basic needs – Food/nutrients, energy, water, air, shelter/protection, space.
4.
living things – Plants and animals, anything that has basic needs.
5.
nonliving things – Rocks, dead leaves, paper, anything that does not use
basic needs.
6.
ecosystem – A community of living and nonliving things that interrelate in
an environment.
7.
ecology – The area of science concerned with the relationship of living
things to each other and to their natural environment.
8.
terrarium – From the Latin word terra, which means “land”, a container for
land organisms.
9.
habitat – The dwelling or place where an animal normally lives, that
provides an animal’s basic needs.
10. aquarium – From the Latin word aqua, which means “water”, a container
for water organisms.
11. aquatic – A water living organism.
12. producers – Organisms such as green plants and algae that carry on
photosynthesis to produce their own food.
13. consumers – Organisms such as animals like moose and water fleas, that
eat or consume water plants and algae.
14. territorial – Animals that fight off other animals in their habitat.
15. larvae – An immature form of an insect, a stage in its life cycle.
16. fry – A young Mosquito Fish.
17. vertebrates – Animals with a backbone, such as a fish.
18. live-bearers – Organisms that produce young born alive and fully formed.
19. egg bearers - Organisms that produce young as eggs.
20. Gastropods – A large class of animals that include snails.
21. radula – The tongue of a snail that has teeth.
22. mantle – An organ inside the snail that produces the shell.
23. germinate – When a plant begins to grow.
24. terrestrial – Land living organism
25. respiration – The process of plants providing oxygen and the animals using
the oxygen for energy.
26. photosynthesis – A plants ability to use the sun and produce their own
food.
27. characteristics – Special features of an animal.
28. scavenger – Organisms that eat dead plants and animals