Ecology Chapter 11 (BLOCK 3)

Formal species description is numbered to be _____

2 million. Most of these are insects, followed by other invertebrates and plants.

Proportion of all described species:

Chordates ____

Unicellular organisms ____

Fungi ____

Plants ____

Other invertebrates ____

Insects ____

Chordates = 60,000 (3.4%)

Unicellular organisms = 70,000 (3.5%)

Fungi = 100,000 (5.2%)

Plants = 310,000 (16.3%)

Other invertebrates = 360,000 (18.9%)

Insects = 1,000,000 (52,6%)

How many described species does Coleoptera have?

About 400,000. Or 1 in 4 species on the planet.

Problem 1: Synonymy: ___→ ___

Multiple names for the same species → leads to overcounting.

Nyssa sylvatica

Commonly known as Black Tupelo, black gum, sour gum, pepperidge, swamp tupelo, beetlebung.

Black Tupelo

The most widely used common name.

Liriodendron tulipifera: Synonymy

Known for its unique tulip-shaped flowers.

AKA: tulip tree, yellow poplar, tulip poplar, whitewood, fiddle tree, american tulip tree.

Crayfish: Synonymy

AKA crawfish, crawdad, mudbug, freshwatewr lobster..

Groundhog: Synonymy

AKA Woodchuck, whistle-pig, land beaver, forest marmot.

Problem 2: Cryptic Species

Multiple species hiding under one similar specie’s name.

What did DNA help us figure out about cryptic species?

Allowed us too identify that there were at least a couple of distinct species categorized into one species. They look similar but have different feeding habits and live in different ecosystems and do not interbreed.

Worms could have multiple names based on ______

Their history and characteristics.

Problem 3: Why is describing new species hard?

Most are hard to see.

Most species are _______

Prokaryotes and rely on genetic and genomic identification.

Problem 4: Finding new big species compared to small species. Give example

If we cant find big mountain lions in the NE US, how are we going to find beetles in a treetop in the jungle?

The uneven search efforts about finding and identifying species means that scientists are profoundly ignorant about the number of species living in vast regions.

What has funding agencies in universities favored?

Molecular biology, genetics, and bioinformatics.

What did technological shifts in DNA and genetics lead to?

Loss of taxonomy skills in favor of lab based skills.

Taxonomy is perceived as ____

Being dated or less lucrative than other fields of biology.

Species Diversity

A combination of the number of species and their relative abundance.

Species Richness

Number of species in a population.

Species Evenness

Relative abundance of species.

Species Abundance

Number of individuals in a species and the number of species with that many individuals in the community.

Give an example of species abundance relationships

30 different species were only found once.

10 species had 40 or more individuals.

Usually axes are _____

Ordinal (1,2,3,4) or common log, base 10 (1,10,100,1000 just add a zero each time).

Population uses _______

Natural log (base 2.718).

Species abundance curves use _____

Binary log, base 2 (2,4,8,16,32).

The Binary Graph

Bell shaped curve. Most plant species in this community have moderate coverage.

Most lognormal bell curve distribution _____

Are not completely visible.

Usually it’s half a bell, and the more samples the more complete.

Species Area Relationship and X-axis

X-axis: represents the cumulative area sampled.

Species accumulate quickly and then more slowly once common species have been identified.

y (gamma) diversity

Species richness across large regional areas.

a (alpha) diversity

The average number of species found within small, local-scale habitats.

B (beta) diversity

Heterogeneity (difference) in species among localities (a good thing).

Diversity Equation

y = B * a

B = y/a

Why is drops in B concerning?

That metric shows amount of small, local scale richness.

Diversity Coffee Shop Example

A few big shops (Tims, Starbucks, Dunkin) move into area and open many shops. Overall count is up but the unique independent shops all went out of business and there are only three types of coffee now.

Shannon-Weiner Index Equation

H’ = - E [p_i*ln(p_i)]

What do the variables of Shannon-Weiner Index Equation stand for? H’ = - E [p_i*ln(p_i)]

H’ = the value of the index.

p_i = proportion of the i^th species in a sample.

ln = natural log of p_i

Shannon-Weiner Index Equation Simplified

H’ = - E [(n₁/N)*ln(n₁/N) + (n₂/N)*ln(n₂/N) + …]

Community

Association of interacting species inhabiting a defined area.

Guild

Organisms that make their livings in similar ways.