Chapter 5: The Living World: Ecosystems

10 percent rule

90 percent of energy is used by the organism and only 10 percent moves up the pyramid because the organism below it used up the energy to heat its body and move, etc

Biome

Major communities of plants and animals

Carbon cycle

How carbon cycles in the environment

Commensalism

One species benefits and the other is unaffected

Competition

Two species competing for the same resources

Intraspecific

competition between members of the same species

Interspecific

competition between members of different species

Desert

Dry with little vegetation

Ecosystem

Living and nonliving parts of an environment

Food chains

Visual representation of how one organism is food source for another

Food web

Visual representation that is more like real life with multiple food source options for each animal

Gross Productivity

The total rate of photosynthesis in an area, or the full amount of food produced by the producers

Hydrologic cycle

Otherwise known as the water cycle and includes evaporation, condensation, runoff, precipitation, and transpiration

Mutualism

Both species benefit by being in the relationship

Net Productivity

The difference between gross productivity and the energy lost by producers for respiration

Nitrogen cycle

Nitrogen makes up 78 percent of our atmosphere

Phosphorus cycle

Phosphorus cycles in the environment but it is a slow cycle with no atmospheric form

Predator-prey

One eats, one gets eaten

Primary productivity

The rate at which food energy is generated by photosynthesis

Savanna

Grassland with a wet season and a dry season; wildfires are common

Shrubland

Hot, dry summers and cool, moist winters; found near coasts with short trees and grasses

Taiga

Lengthy cold, wet winters with lots of coniferous trees

Temperate grassland

Lots of grasses, low rainfall

Temperate rainforest

Coniferous and broadleaf trees with lots of rain

Temperate seasonal forests

Four seasons with warm, wet summers and cold winters

Trophic levels

Made up of producers, primary consumers, secondary consumers, and decomposers and shows that each level has less energy available

Tropical rainforests

Greatest diversity of species with rain all year and warm all year

Tundra

Extremely cold, no trees, little rain

freshwater biomes examples

rivers, lakes, streams, ponds.

Saltwater biomes examples

oceans, coral reefs, kelp forests, marshlands, estuaries, mangrove forests, tidepools