Ecology Exam Review
If you know all of this….you’ll get an A+
Know these terms!!!!
 Community…all living things in an area
(not just one kind of organism)
 Population….all of ONE kind of species in
an area
 Biome…same kind of ecosystem in the
world…all deserts or all rainforests…not a
specific one!
 Ecosystem…all biotic (living) and abiotic
(nonliving) things in an area
Carbon Cycle
Water Cycle
Oxygen Cycle
Trophic Levels….and stuff
 Producers…are plants (and some bacteria)
 Primary consumers….are herbivores
because they eat plants
 Secondary consumers…are carnivores
because they eat other consumers
More key terms you need to be
able to define….
 Biodiversity…variety of living things in an
area…higher at the equator and lower near
the poles
 Herbivore…eats plants…bunny rabbit
 Carnivore….eats animals…lion
 Omnivore…eats both plants and
animals..human
 Detrivore….eats dead stuff…vulture
 Decomposer…kind of detrivore that returns
nutrients to soil..mushrooms
Is it alive????
BIOTIC…yes! It is alive!
ABIOTIC… NO!!!! Not alive…never
was alive…never will be alive…
Energy…it’s essential for life!
 Most of the energy in an ecosystem is
provided by the producers….that’s why
they’re called producers…they produce the
energy for the ecosystem….funny, huh?
 Where do those producers, or autotrophs,
get that energy….well that big yellow thing
in the sky…it’s called the sun!
I love a good competition
 Intraspecific…this is like two gorillas who both
want to rescue the same girl from the top of
the building beating their chests and grunting
at each other in competition. You’ve heard of
Donkey Kong….right?
 Interspecific…that’s like you trying to compete
with the gorilla for the girl….sorry boys…you’re
likely to lose unless you don’t fight fair
 Parasitism…well a leech, the clingy guy you
feel like you can’t ever get rid of…but seriously
more like a the kind you get in the water that
suck your blood
Populations….the more the
merrier…sometimes
Population density = # of individuals
/ area
The population increases (more!)
when you increase births and
immigration!
The population decreases (less!)
when you have more deaths and
emigration!
Growth patterns
 Logistic growth
 Exponential Growth
Mountain ecology
Lower on the mountain there are
different types of plants and animals
because it is warmer…the elevation
(how high the mountain is) is what
changes the type of vegetation on
the mountain
More ecology stuff…
 The tropical zone is where it is
consistently warm and moist… along the
equator
 Deciduous trees…lose their leaves in the
winter…maple, oak, sycamores
 Coniferous trees…keep their needles yearround and have cones….pines, spruces,
firs
 River…water moves along
 Wetland…water is stagnant
Food chain with trophic levels
Producers
is where
the most
energy is
in the
food
chain!
Where we live…
GREAT BASIN
DESERT!!!
Bye bye birdies
Well…if you cut down the forest
there are no more homes for
the birdies so they will leave
along with the rest of the
animals…biodiversity definitely
decreases!
Pyramid of numbers
New populations…succession
 Primary succession….there wasn’t ever
anything there to begin with…a new island
in the ocean created by the eruption of a
volcano
 Secondary succession…ecosystem is
destroyed by some kind of disaster like a
fire, but the soil is still intact and so plants
grow back quickly
Population Crash Causes
Over-hunting of an organism…killing
all of the whales!
Climate change…dinosaurs couldn’t
handle colder weather, such as an
ice age.
Disease…most Native Americans
died back in the day because
Europeans brought all kinds of nasty
diseases with them
More about the Great Basin
Desert!
Plant life…lots of big sagebrush,
rabbit brush, snakeweed, and
salt brush
Animals…kangaroo rats,
jackrabbits, coyotes
The great state of Nevada
What…a high biodiversity in
Nevada…sounds crazy right?? In
fact, there are a lot of different
ecosystems in Nevada because of
the different elevations here!
Limits…what do we know about
limits
 Well, in calculus a limit is defined as the
"the limit of f of x, as x approaches c, is
L".
 Are you confused????
 Hahaha….
 Okay, in biology a population is limited by
the number of organisms that can be
supported by the resources in that
area…like amount of water and amount of
food!
Energy in a food web
 Where does all of the energy for the food
web come from?????
 Well….the sun of course!
What affects the vegetation in an
area?
TEMPERATURE
MOISTURE