Population: The number of organisms of the same species living in an ecosystem.
Community: All of the populations of organisms within an ecosystem.
Ecosystem: A system of living things that interact with each other and with the physical world.
Biome: A collection of related ecosystems. An ecologist might study how climate change affects the ecosystems of the Arctic Biome.
Biosphere: All of the biomes, all of the ecysostems on Earth, from the poles to the equator, from the atmosphere to kilometers into the Earth's crust.
The polar bear is considered a marine mammal because it can swim and live in the water; they obtain most of their food from the ocean.
Abiotic factors are the non-living, physical factors of an environment:
-Changes of temperature, changes in the amount of sunlight, the strength and variation of the wind, the amount of rain or snowfall (precipitation), and the presence of salt or fresh water are all abiotic factors.
biotic factors are living things of an environment:
-If seals move to a new area, the bears must also move in an ecosystem.
Consumers consume the producers or consumers. eg. birds of prey eat fish, consumers. Then, the fish eats the producer, algae and other small animals.
Producers produce the needed nutrients for the consumers. eg. trees and plants.
Decomposers decompose the dead producers/comsumers. eg. mushrooms, worms, insects, etc.
However, a non-bidegradable material that can remain in landfills for many years is polystyrene (poly-sty-ren. Alias: Styrofoam, a type of plastic) and can not be broken down my decomposers.
Virus, protozoan, bacteria and fungus are the four kinds of harmful microbes.
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