Predator and Prey

• The life processes of plants and animals are interdependent and contribute to the flow of energy and cycles of matter within an ecosystem.
• The interaction between a consumer that captures and consumes another consumer is the predator-prey relationship.
• Many animals exhibit social behaviors that help them obtain resources.
  
  • Herbivores often exhibit herding behaviors, which can protect the group from predators.
  • Predators often work together to hunt, capture, and share their prey as well as to raise offspring.
• Organisms may exist as members of a population; populations interact and are interdependent with other populations in a community.

Competition & Cooperation

• Members of a population interact with other populations in a community.
• They compete to obtain the matter and energy they need for basic resources, mates, and territory, and cooperate to meet basic needs and carry out life processes.
• Organisms or populations that rely on each other for basic needs form interdependent communities, where a change in the population of one organism will affect the survival of others.
• Environmental factors (biotic and abiotic), which determine the types and number of organisms of a species in an ecosystem, are called limiting factors.
  • Many limiting factors affect the growth of populations in nature.

You should:
• from graphs like the one above understand the relationship between predator and prey populations
• explain the effects of resource availability on organisms and populations in an ecosystem.
• predict the effect of limiting factors on organisms, populations, and/or communities in a food web/ecosystem.

symbiotic relationships

Symbiosis is a close relationship between individuals of two different species living together.Symbiotic relationships include.

• mutualism (whereby both organisms benefit)
• commensalism (whereby one organism benefits and the other is unaffected), and
• parasitism (whereby one organism benefits and the other is harmed).
• know the types of symbiosis and give examples of each


Niche

The physical location where organisms live is called their habitat.

• Each living thing fills a specific role, or niche, in its habitat.
• A niche helps an organism meet basic needs for life processes.
• infer the niche of organisms from their physical characteristics.