Ecosystems have no particular size. An ecosystem can be as large as a desert or a lake or as small as a tree or a puddle. If you have a terrarium, that is an artificial ecosystem. The water, water temperature, plants, animals, air, light and soil all work together.
If there isn't enough light or water or if the soil doesn't have the right nutrients, the plants will die. If the plants die, animals that depend on them will die. If the animals that depend on the plants die, any animals that depend on those animals will die. Ecosystems in nature work the same way. All the parts work together to make a balanced system! A healthy ecosystem has lots of species diversity and is less likely to be seriously damaged by human interaction, natural disasters and climate changes.
Every species has a niche in its ecosystem that helps keep the system healthy. We are learning about new species every day, and we are just figuring out the roles they play in the natural world.
By studying and maintaining biodiversity, we help keep our planet healthy. In a lake ecosystem, the sun hits the water and helps the algae grow. For example, if carnivores say, a wolf are eliminated from an ecosystem, then too many herbivores for example, deer are allowed to grow to maturity and reproduce. The growing number of herbivores deplete the plants, preventing them from reproducing and thus leaving fewer offspring behind.
Eventually, the herbivores will begin to starve in large numbers, possibly even becoming extinct in that region. Similarly, if rain fall, temperature, seasonal cycle, the presence of sarcovores, and the presence of herbivores are altered, the system will break down and the entire region will be affected adversely. Hinckley is conversant in Arabic, and is a part-time lecturer at two Midwestern universities. Flora Plants, or flora, are the primary producers of an ecosystem.
Chemical Reactions Involved in the Growth of Plants. Summary of an Ecosystem. The Energy Cycle in an Ecosystem. Ecosystems are often connected in a larger biome. Biomes are large sections of land, sea, or atmosphere. Forest s, ponds, reef s, and tundra are all types of biomes, for example. They're organized very generally, based on the types of plants and animals that live in them. Within each forest, each pond, each reef, or each section of tundra, you'll find many different ecosystems.
The biome of the Sahara Desert , for instance, includes a wide variety of ecosystems. The arid climate and hot weather characterize the biome. Within the Sahara are oasis ecosystems, which have date palm trees, freshwater , and animals such as crocodile s.
The Sahara also has dune ecosystems, with the changing landscape determine d by the wind. Organisms in these ecosystems, such as snakes or scorpions, must be able to survive in sand dunes for long periods of time. The Sahara even includes a marine environment, where the Atlantic Ocean creates cool fog s on the Northwest African coast. Shrub s and animals that feed on small trees, such as goats, live in this Sahara ecosystem.
Even similar-sounding biomes could have completely different ecosystems. The biome of the Sahara Desert, for instance, is very different from the biome of the Gobi Desert in Mongolia and China.
The Gobi is a cold desert , with frequent snowfall and freezing temperatures. Unlike the Sahara, the Gobi has ecosystems based not in sand, but kilometers of bare rock.
Some grass es are able to grow in the cold, dry climate. As a result, these Gobi ecosystems have grazing animal s such as gazelle s and even takhi , an endangered species of wild horse. Even the cold desert ecosystems of the Gobi are distinct from the freezing desert ecosystems of Antarctica.
Antarcticas thick ice sheet covers a continent made almost entirely of dry, bare rock. Only a few moss es grow in this desert ecosystem, supporting only a few birds, such as skua s. Threats to Ecosystems For thousands of years, people have interacted with ecosystems.
Many cultures developed around nearby ecosystems. Many Native American tribes of North Americas Great Plains developed a complex lifestyle based on the native plants and animals of plain s ecosystems, for instance.
Bison , a large grazing animal native to the Great Plains, became the most important biotic factor in many Plains Indians cultures, such as the Lakota or Kiowa. Bison are sometimes mistakenly called buffalo. These tribes used buffalo hide s for shelter and clothing, buffalo meat for food, and buffalo horn for tools.
The tallgrass prairie of the Great Plains supported bison herd s, which tribes followed throughout the year. As human populations have grown, however, people have overtaken many ecosystems. The tallgrass prairie of the Great Plains, for instance, became farmland. As the ecosystem shrunk, fewer bison could survive.
Today, a few herds survive in protected ecosystems such as Yellowstone National Park. In the tropical rain forest ecosystems surrounding the Amazon River in South America, a similar situation is taking place. The Amazon rain forest includes hundreds of ecosystems, including canopies, understories, and forest floors.
These ecosystems support vast food web s. Canopies are ecosystems at the top of the rainforest, where tall, thin trees such as fig s grow in search of sunlight. Canopy ecosystems also include other plants, called epiphyte s, which grow directly on branches. Understory ecosystems exist under the canopy. They are darker and more humid than canopies. Animals such as monkey s live in understory ecosystems, eating fruits from trees as well as smaller animals like beetles.
Forest floor ecosystems support a wide variety of flower s, which are fed on by insect s like butterflies. Butterflies, in turn, provide food for animals such as spider s in forest floor ecosystems. Human activity threatens all these rain forest ecosystems in the Amazon.
Thousands of acres of land are cleared for farmland, housing, and industry. Countries of the Amazon rain forest, such as Brazil, Venezuela, and Ecuador, are underdeveloped. Cutting down trees to make room for crop s such as soy and corn benefits many poor farmers. These resource s give them a reliable source of income and food. Children may be able to attend school, and families are able to afford better health care. According to the law of energy conservation, energy can neither be created nor destroyed.
In fact, it can only be transformed or transferred from one form to another. But how does this work in an ecosystem? How does energy flow here? Sometimes, we even end up completely changing it from its original foundations.
Today, human activities have such an impact on ecosystems that we now speak of the Anthropocene timeline. This period in time also considers changes happening due to climate change events, which is also mainly caused by human activities. We can see all these changes everywhere. When trees are taken down in the Amazonian forest, the ecosystems change as species struggle to survive and the local humidity and the climate both change. An example often used about how human activities affect ecosystems is the US Yellowstone National Park.
Here, as in other national parks, the U. Biological Survey decided to kill wolfs and other species as a predator control measure. The problem was that the disappearance of the wolf population affected all the ecosystem in the long run, even changing the course of the local river. The wolf was later reintroduced in the Park, around 70 years later, in an attempt to restore the balance of the ecosystem. Check out the whole story on this video:.
Like all other living beings, humans are dependant on natural ecosystem services to survive. We need it to get the food we eat, the water we drink and to transform raw materials into our everyday products.
For example, the agriculture that provides our food depends on the characteristics of a specific ecosystem. Cereals or vegetables grow only under certain conditions of temperature and humidity. They also need certain natural processes, such as pollination, to take place.
But the fact is that some ecosystem services are currently under threat. There are four main categories of ecosystem services:. Learn more about ecosystem services, how natural resources are being overexploited, how the environment is being damaged and how to protect ecosystem services for the future generations:.
Human activities are having a negative impact on ecosystems. In fact, according to the famous Millennium Ecosystems Assessment , at the beginning of the 20th century, human activities changed ecosystems more rapidly than ever before.
Humaking has been demanding for food, water, food, timber, and other materials like crazy. And all these demands have been highly contributing to deforestation to grow more crops , the loss of natural pollination bees are disappearing , water pollution from animal excreta and pesticides to plastic , soil exploitation due to intensive agriculture , overfishing and huge biodiversity loss.
But why are humans affecting ecosystems this much?
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