Ecology vocab Flashcards
(29 cards)
The living things in an ecosystem. Ex( animals, plants, bacteria, fungi).
Biotic factor
Nonliving things in an ecosystem that affect living organisms and the functioning of the environment. Ex(wind, rain, temp, altitude, pollution).
Abiotic factor
An individual animal, plant, or single-celled life form.
Organism
A group of living organisms consisting of similar individuals capable of exchanging genes or interbreeding.
Species
Distribution and abundance of animal and plant populations. Ex (deer population).
Population
Interacting group of various species in a common location. Ex(forest of trees and undergrowth plants, inhabited by animals and rooted in soil containing bacteria and fungi).
Community
The natural home or environment of an animal, plant, or other organism
Habitat
Organisms better adapted to their environment tend to survive and produce more offspring.
Natural selection
The process by which different kinds of living organisms are thought to have developed and diversified from earlier forms during the history of the earth.
Evolution
Organism that produces complex organic compounds from simple substances present in its surroundings, generally using energy from light/photosynthesis or inorganic chemical reactions (chemosynthesis).
Producer/autotrophs
Organism that cant manufacture its own food and instead obtains its food and energy by taking in organic substances, usually plant or animal matter. All animals, protozoans, fungi, and most bacteria are heterotrophs.
Consumer/Heterotrophs
Organism that feeds on primary producers, usually herbivores that feed on autotrophic plants
Primary consumer
Primarily animals which eat primary consumers, secondary consumers can be classified into one of two groups: carnivores, or meat eaters, and omnivores, which are plant and meat eaters.
Secondary consumer
A carnivore at the topmost level in a food chain that feeds on other carnivores; an animal that feeds only on secondary consumers.
Tertiary consumer
Eats only plants
Herbivore
Eats only meat
Carnivore
Eats both plants and animals
Omnivore
An organism, especially a soil bacterium, fungus, or invertebrate, that decomposes organic material.
Decomposers
Series of organisms each dependent on the next as a source of food.
Food chain
A system of interlocking and interdependent food chains.
Food web
Graphical model of energy flow in a community. The different levels represent different groups of organisms that might compose a food chain
Energy pyramid
Circulation of carbon atoms in the biosphere as a result of photosynthetic conversion of carbon dioxide into complex organic compounds by plants, which are consumed by other organisms: the carbon returns to the atmosphere in the form of carbon dioxide as a result of respiration
Carbon cycle
Continuous sequence of events by which atmospheric nitrogen and nitrogenous compounds in the soil are converted.
Nitrogen cycle
Process of change in the species structure of an ecological community over time. The time scale can be decades
Ecological succession
