Principles of Ecosystems PDF

Lesson 13.4 The Principles of the Ecosystem  Learning Objectives At the end of this lesson, the learner should be able to do the following: explain the organizational structure of the ecosystem; and enumerate the different levels of organizations in an ecosystem. A...

Lesson 13.4 The Principles of the Ecosystem  Learning Objectives At the end of this lesson, the learner should be able to do the following: explain the organizational structure of the ecosystem; and enumerate the different levels of organizations in an ecosystem. A species pertains to the group of individuals who are genetically similar and related that made them capable to breed and produce offspring. An individual , on the other hand, refers to a single unit of species. Species is often represented by its species scientific name that consists of two words having the genus name as the first word and the specific epithet as the second word. For example, the scientific name for humans is Homo sapiens. A group of individuals belonging to similar species of organism and living in a specific location at a given time is called a population. A community includes all present populations of species in a specific geographic region at a particular time. An ecosystem includes more than a community of living things or biotic components. It also includes nonliving components present in the surroundings or the abiotic components. A biome is a set of ecosystems that share highly similar characteristics in terms of the abiotic factors adapted to their environments. A biome may consist of several ecosystems on land or aquatic habitat Earth’s biomes can be categorized into terrestrial biomes and aquatic biomes. COMMON FORM OF BIOMES Tropical rainforest is a biome characterized by the hot climate in the tropics and very high precipitation. Also, it has the highest diversity of plants and animals among all terrestrial biomes. Temperate forest has a moderate temperature with distinct seasonal changes over time. The temperate forest has tall tree types, both angiosperms and gymnosperms. Taiga has a cold and icy temperature. It has small precipitation that allows coniferous trees to be densely packed in this kind of biome.  Savanna is a warm biome with a medium amount of moisture and experiences seasonal droughts. It is characterized with a dense grassland and few, scattered trees and shrubs. Temperate grassland is a biome with moderate temperatures and precipitation. Most trees and shrubs are not present. The grasses serve as the primary vegetation in this biome. Deserts have extreme temperature conditions and very low precipitation. The most dominant forms of vegetation include the succulent plants that are capable of storing water in their stems. Tundra has freezing temperatures and little precipitation. The vegetation is slowly growing and mostly represented by mosses. Usually, only plants with short roots thrive because of the frozen soil layer called permafrost. Some perennial plants are also present during summer. Freshwater biomes are aquatic biomes that have a minimal salt concentration in the water. It consists of aquatic plants and animals that cannot tolerate high salinity levels in the water. Marine biomes are aquatic biomes represented by the oceans and the seas. They are distinct due to the high concentration of salt in their waters.