Ecosystem Relationships & Biomes
Ever wonder why certain animals live together or why some environments have more plants than others? It all comes down to relationships! An ecosystem is a community where living organisms interact with nonliving components as a system.
Living (biotic) components include producers like plants, and consumers like herbivores, carnivores, and omnivores. Nonliving (abiotic) factors include sunlight, temperature, precipitation, and soil pH. These relationships can be predator-prey (where predator populations follow prey populations over time) or symbiotic (living together). Symbiotic relationships come in three types: mutualism (both benefit), commensalism (one benefits, one unaffected), and parasitism (one benefits, one harmed).
When resources are limited, competition occurs either between different species (interspecific) or within the same species (intraspecific). To reduce competition, species develop resource partitioning - using the same resources in different ways.
Ecosystems are organized from small to large: organism → population → community → ecosystem → biome → biosphere. Terrestrial biomes are characterized by temperature, precipitation, and latitude. Generally, hotter and more humid regions support greater biodiversity and primary productivity.
Remember this! Climate graphs are important tools that show both temperature and precipitation patterns in different biomes - they help explain why certain plants and animals live where they do.
