Community Ecology
Guided Inquiry
Dr. Pool
Names:
1. In your own words, what is community ecology?
(Note: your readings for today should help you bring together your answer)
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For the next 3 questions, use the following link as a resource (https://www.learner.org/series/the-habitable-planet-a-systems-approach-to-environmental-science/ecosystems/online-textbook/). You will need the content in the 7. Ecological Niches section.
2. In Table 4. which of these types of interactions do you think is the most common in real world food webs?
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3. In the question above, you described community ecology. What componants within an ecosystem are important to consider when asking community ecology questions? In other words, when we are trying to understand how species interact in a community, what factors are important?
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4. Choose one species (any species is okay) and then identify a few “biotic” and “abiotic” factors that would define its ecological niche.
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The remaining questions relate to your assigned reading (i.e. Species with a Large Impact on Community Structure by Smee).
http://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/species-with-a-large-impact-on-community-13240710
5. What is a keystone species? Are keystone species always top predators? Explain.
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6. Describe a local community interaction that illustrates the effects of a keystone species. For example, predict what might happen to the important kelp forests of our Pacific NW if otters went extinct locally? Would it impact fish? Why or why not?
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7. What two ways do top predators affect trophic cascades? How might this be used to argue for return of top predators (wolves) to ecosystems where they have become extinct?
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8. In what way are wolves thought to be a keystone species?
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9. The reading suggests that overfishing of pollack in Alaska resulted in an increase in sea urchins that ultimately overgrazed kelp forests. Given that pollack don’t eat sea urchins, why is an understanding of the community ecology in this ecosystem required to understand the connection between human activity and the Alaskan kelp forests? Explain.
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10. Clearly, top predators are often important for maintianing food web structure in complext communities. However, “dominate species” are the most abundant species within a system and are often secondary level (lower level) consumers. If you were the manager of a wildlife researve and you had a limited conservation budget, would you choose to focus your conservation efforts on the keystone species or most dominate species in your system?
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