• What is meant by an ecosystem

• The biotic and abiotic community

• Food chains and trophic levels,
• Species interaction
• The biosphere is made up of the
living organisms of the earth , and
their environments

• Ecology
- Ecology is the study of the
relationship between organisms and
their environment
• A community of organisms and its local nonliving
environment in which matter (chemical cycles)
and energy flows

• An ecosystem is a system describing the

interactions between living organisms

• Can be artificial or natural

1) Structure
• non-living
• Living (biological community)
2) Processes
• Cycling of elements
• Flow of energy (input and output)
3) Change
• Succession
• Biological Process
– food chains and webs
• Physical Process
– hydrological cycle
• Bio-Physical Process
– nutrient cycling and eutrophication

6
• 1. Components of an ecosystem

Abiotic components
- inorganic nutrients ,e.g water,carbon,
gases and minerals

- organic nutrients in leaves, fruit and meat

2) Biotic Factors
• A) Producers are green plants which convert
simple inorganic matter such as CO2 , water and
minerals into organic compounds
• B) Consumers are the different types of animals
that eat producers
- primary consumers: herbivores that feed on plants
- Secondary consumers: carnivores
- Tertiary and quarternary consumers
- Omnivores ( feed on both plants and animals)
- Detritivores
• C) decomposer
- like bacteria and fungi
- They recycle nutrients by breaking down
dead organisms into inorganic compounds
again for absorption by green plants
 Hawk Sun

Wolf

Fox Rabbit

Water
Buffalo

Grasshopper
Chicken

Mouse

Grass

Decomposers
• Autotrophs : make their own food

• Heterotrophs : get their energy from the autotrophs.

They are the consumers and decomposers

• The food chain is a specific pathway of food transfer

in which one kind, or one level of organisms feed
upon another in a sequence of levels
• The primary producers- plants and algae
which use light energy to converts CO2 and
H2O to carbohydrates which support life
through the process of photosynthesis
• Primary consumers (First level)
• Secondary consumers
• Tertiary consumers
• Decomposer
• Simple food chain rarely occur. Instead
there are many interconnections of linear
food chains into food webs
Trophic level: All the organisms that
are the same number of food-chain steps
from the primary source of energy

Modified from: General Ecology, by David T. Krome

• The producers, consumers, and decomposers
of each ecosystem make up a food chain.
• There are many food chains in an ecosystem.
• Food chains show where energy is transferred
and not who eats who.
• Ecosystems have inputs of matter and energy used to
build the biological structures ,to reproduce, and to
maintain necessary internal energy levels.

• The inputs to, and outputs from , any ecosystem

represent a link with other parts of the environment.
Some of the outputs from one area become inputs
into adjacent areas
• Solar radiation : supplies energy to the ecosystem

• Water : supplied by rainfall, irrigation, etc

• Nutrients : supplied by rock weathering or by man’s use

of fertilizers

• Animals : animals migrate into the areas

• Plants and seeds : wind and streams may carry seed

which germinate into plants, and man also introduce
seeds or seedlings
• Water : lost through transpiration, runoff of
drainage
• Animals: migrate away
• Plants and seeds : carried away by winds or
removed by man through harvest or
lumbering
• Gases and heat : escape back to the
atmosphere
• Competition leads to resource
allocation
• Intraspecific – among members of
same species: mates, food, shelter
• Interspecific - between different
species: food.
• Organisms are grouped as producers,
consumers or decomposers

• Consumers may be herbivores,

carnivores, omnivores and
scavengers
• Herbivores, carnivores and omnivores
feed on live prey and are predators
• Scavengers, detritivores and
decomposers are not predators
• Parasites are predatory
• Predators prey on the least fit members
of their target species
• Coevolution happens when two or more species
influence each other's evolution, each species
adapts to changes in the other.
• Flowering plants and insects that pollinate them
• Defensive adaptations in prey are matched by
adaptations in the predators aimed at overcoming
them.
• Symbiosis – Two or more species live
intimately together with their fates
linked
• Mutualism – 2 species interact in a way that
benefits both species; bee and flower
• Parasitism – parasite lives in/on a host; weakens
but usually does not kill host; tapeworm, flea,
tick, lice
• Commensalism – 1 organism benefits & the
other is neither helped nor harmed; birds nest
in trees, barnacle and whale
• Predator -Prey Interactions
• Predator mediated competition:
1. a superior competitor builds a larger
population than a competitor
2. Predators take notice and increase hunting
pressure on the superior species reducing its
abundance allowing weaker species to
increase in number
• Predator prey relationships exert selection
pressures that favor evolutionary
adaptation
• Toxic chemicals, body armor, speed, ability
to hide are protective strategies