intro to animals

what good are the small animals to us?

• they produce diverse and complex food webs that ultimately might include humans

• they have aesthetic, scientific, and recreational value

• bioindicators

  • water quality

  • habitat quality

  • symbiosis

Linnean classification

• dear (domain)

• king (kingdom)

• phillip (phylum)

• came (class)

• over (order)

• for (family)

• good (genus)

• soup (species)

how do you define species?

they are genetically similar and are able to reproduce viable offspring

why does it matter how we define a species?

• consistency

• recognition

• conservation

• understanding phylogeny

biological species concept

genetically distinctive group that interbreeds freely under natural conditions and are reproductively isolated from other groups

• traditionally based on morphological differences

• more recently molecular techniques

why is rRNA used for molecular genetics?

it is highly conserved and most mutations are lethal

ways to classify organisms

• energy source

• diet

• interaction type

• habitat

classification of organisms by energy source

• autotrophic vs heterotrophic

  • can be further broken down into their sources of energy (photo, chemical, chemo-, organic C) and electron acceptor (O2, organic C)

• mixotrophs can do both

classification of organisms by diet

• detritivory vs predation

• place on food web

  • grazers or herbivores eat primary producers

  • carnivores eat other consumers

• functional feeding groups

  • shredders- shred leaves

  • grazers- eat algae or plants

  • collectors- collect particles

  • carnivores- eat other animals

classification of organisms by direct interaction type

• competition +/+

• mutualism +/+

• exploitation +/-

  • parasitism & predation

• commensalism +/0

• amensalism -/0

• neutralism 0/0