quiz 2

Question 1

ecosystem processes

Answer 1

Rates of cycling of energy and matter and nutrients

Question 2

ecosystem service

Answer 2

An ecosystem process (cycling of energy/matter/nutrients) that benefits humanity

Question 3

what are the four ecosystem services (ecosystem process that benefits humanity) that wetlands do

Answer 3

dampening flow - like a sponge, wetlands can store water and slowly release it, dampens flows and helps decrease the risk of downstream flooding (can also release during the summer to prevent droughts)

cleaning water - wetlands will accumulate and store toxins, sediments, and transforms nutrients

carbon storage - water logged/ anoxic sediments, organic matter is broken down slowly in wetlands so it accumulates in the sediments and stores it

primary production - productive system that supports food web

Question 4

carbon storage in seasonal vs permanent wetland

Answer 4

seasonal wetland - little long-term storage because wet-dry cycle enables decomposition

permanent wetland- lots of long-term storage due to water-logged anoxic sediments

Question 5

nutrient cycling in seasonal vs permanent wetland

Answer 5

seasonal- wet-dry cycle enables transformation of nutrients, more soluble nutrients

permanent wetland - due to anoxic sediments, nutrients may accumulate trapped in sediments (lower bio available nutrients)

Question 6

productivity in seasonal/permanent wetland

Answer 6

seasonal - higher
permanent - lower

Question 7

organisms that exist in seasonal/permanent wetlands

Answer 7

seasonal - animals with short generation times or short aquatic life stages

permanent - animals with longer aquatic phase or generation times

Question 8

methods for surviving wetland seasonality (don’t describe)

Answer 8

diapause, quiescence/anhydrobiosis, migration

Question 9

diapause

Answer 9

when organisms produce resting eggs that can persist during dry phases e.g many zooplankton

Question 10

quiescence/anhydrobiosis

Answer 10

organisms enter a stage where they can resist drying out i.e tardigrades, some rotifers, nematodes

Question 11

migration for wetland seasonality

Answer 11

some organisms undergo metamorphosis from aquatic larvae to terrestrial adult stage - amphibians, most aquatic insects (could just leave)

Question 12

talk about juvenile salmon and their use of wetlands

Answer 12

will migrate at specific times when there are wet periods in the wetlands so that they can go the through

Question 13

what are resting eggs in wetlands and why are they important

Answer 13

resting eggs can accumulate in the sediment and can be dormant for decades to centuries prior to emergence - can be used for scientific studies to see how ecosystems shift with response to rapid environmental change (looking at old genotypes/populations from the past), evolutionary response to change

Question 14

talk about the alpine wetlands paper

Answer 14

changes by climate change and fish invasions - have changed their system, reduced area for organisms (especially amphibians) that are from there - because the smaller wetlands are more vulnerable to climate change (can dry up) so nowhere for anyone to go - and larger wetlands/ lakes will probably be stocked with fish that were added for fishing driving the amphibians up into the smaller wetlands that don’t have much area to begin with

Question 15

drainage basin

Answer 15

area that drains into a river (watershed) rain drop falls and goes towards water ( is to drainage basin)

Question 16

dendritic networks

Answer 16

branching structure - river carve channels/ valleys in dendritic structure - most effective way to life materials that are dispersed

Question 17

what are the two things streams are characterized by being

Answer 17

nested - many small streams drain into larger streams

hierarchical - hierarchical organization of the river/stream network, where streams of different sizes are interconnected in a systematic manner

Question 18

what would the graph look like if stream number vs order

Answer 18

as stream order increases, stream number decreases (downwards slips) meaning that more streams are smaller less streams are higher order

Question 19

what is stream order? how does a stream increase in order?

Answer 19

stream order is a method to classify streams based on size and position within river/stream network. streams increase in order when two streams of equal order join together

Question 20

describe first- order vs 10 order streams, what order is most common

Answer 20

first- order is typically small, 10 - order are very large, first- order is most common

Question 21

how do the sizes of streams relate to the areas they drain

Answer 21

small streams, drain, small areas, large rivers, drain larger areas 

Question 22

hyporheic river

Answer 22

River beneath the river, water flows through sediment by the river

Question 23

lateral connectivity

Answer 23

Connection side to side i.e. leaves fall into stream (water rises/falls, and connect areas on side)

Question 24

Longitudinal connectivity

Answer 24

connections, upstream/downstream, i.e. stream water transport sediments, and particulate matter downstream

Question 25

flow regime

Answer 25

Pattern of water flow, including floods, overtime of a given system. controls movement of materials snow dominated versus rain dominated

Question 26

rain dominated flow regime

Answer 26

very low flow in summer season (not ouch rain) less flow, small and low in elevation (coming down as rain rather than from mountain)

Question 27

snow dominated flow regime

Answer 27

Water comes down during summer, draining and high elevation, winter – less water, locked as ice

Question 28

how do dams affect flow regime, what is a consequence of that?

Answer 28

in Utah a dam had water flower regime from snow, but because of holding water for them, there’s no seasonality cottonwoods – adapted to live by Rivers, where there is spring melt so seeds can be distributed, natural clock driven by life cycle – – dams, prevent creation of this habitat

Question 29

how is flow regime affected overall

Answer 29

Various year to year based on drought or cold years, but also really affected by climate change, temperature affects the system, which has huge implications

Question 30

What would snow/rain flow regime be like

Answer 30

Low summer/fall, rain in October/November and snow melt in spring

Question 31

What does it mean that food webs are based on green and brown sources of energy?

Answer 31

Green – production based i.e. primary producers, like algae brown – detritus based

Question 32

what is autochenous food web, what are production rates controlled by?

Answer 32

Green - primary production like algae produced from within the ecosystems types – algae (easier to consume than detritud)and macrophytes production rate controlled by; nutrients, temperature, light

Question 33

what is the allochthonous food web

Answer 33

Brown – produced outside, ecosystems i.e. detritus organic matter, falls into the stream, small streams, usually supported by this shredders are important to carbon cycling (breaking particles down - organic input controlled by riparian vegetation type, season, ratio of edge;area)

Question 34

what is the river continuum concept (overall idea)

Answer 34

first unified hypothesis – describes how stream systematically change as one goes from small headwater streams to large lowland rivers. The theory is headwaters to downstream changes where energy comes from and the invertebrates that are there.

Question 35

what would the energy be from in headwater?

Answer 35

Lots of trees, less sun – less autochthonous production (green production) – most carbon from trees (leaves)

Question 36

What would energy be from in downstream?

Answer 36

less overhang from trees, so more local production (getting more light in)

Question 37

What are the important types of organisms in the stream that are part of stream ecology?

Answer 37

shredders – breakdown, big chunks of carbon grazers – more in lower water, where stuff is mostly broken down Predators Collectors – filter outline, particulate matter, downstream

Question 38

what type of organisms will be in headwater?

Answer 38

Shredder - breaking down leaves

Question 39

What type of organisms will be in mid water?

Answer 39

grazers - breaking down smaller things (eating things like algae)

Question 40

what type of organisms will be in down water?

Answer 40

Collectors/gathers

Question 41

by looking at the stream benthic community, what can we learn?

Answer 41

Can learn how the ecosystem is working and where the main source of carbon/energy is based on the river continuum concept

Question 42

what do shredders do?

Answer 42

Taxa that transforms course particular organic matter to find particular organic matter i.e. some big stone flies, wood-cases caddis flies

Question 43

What are examples of grazers?

Answer 43

many clinger mayflies

Question 44

what are collector/gathers (two types)

Answer 44

deposit feeder – these tax of feed from fine particular organic matter that is on the bottom of the stream i.e. chrinomids suspension feeders - taxa that feed on find particulate matter that is drifting downstream. They are filter, feeders, i.e. blackfly larvae

Question 45

what are examples of stream benthic invertebrate that are predators

Answer 45

some stoneflies, beetle larvae

Question 46

why are stream benthic in vertebrates common bioindicators (indicators of health of the stream ecosystem.)

Answer 46

– they are differently sensitive to different stressors. Some that are tolerant, some are quite sensitive stoneflies are indicators of healthy systems, leeches are more tolerant. They stay in place and reflect conditions of that location – will reflect stressors, even if stressor is pulsed and hard to detect - can be easily collected/counted – more economically viable than monitoring water quality – reveal biological impact of potentially multiple stressors .

Question 47

what is the EPT method of looking at stream health?

Answer 47

More simpler method – looking at the proportion of benthic invertebrates communities that are mayflies, stoneflies, and caddisflies – they are usually pollution sensitive so when there are more of them, it is generally an indicator that the stream is healthy and not degraded

Question 48

what is the B – IBI method of stream health

Answer 48

more complex method – benthic index of biotic integrity – metric used to identify and classify water pollution problems – combine different summary statistics such as; richness of the total number of benthic taxa, total number of intolerant, taxa, etc. – a lot of work

Question 49

why is sampling of benthic invertebrate better than just water sampling?

Answer 49

pollution can be transient (happen short term), and not know the long-term effects by just checking the conditions of the water, whereas, looking at the invertebrate will give the overall health of the system