give a technical term for the study of interrelationship between the various forms of life and their environment
Answers
FEEDING RELATIONSHIPS AMONG SPECIES
The Food Chain.
A food chain or food web comprises a sequence of organisms through which energy and nutrients are taken in and used up. A food chain in a wet meadow could be: Grass--> Grasshopper--> Snake--> Hyena.
Food chains begin from producers to consumers and the major feeding levels are called Trophic Levels.
Producers belong to the First Trophic Level. Primary consumers, whether feeding on living or dead producers feed from the Second Trophic Level. Organisms that feed on other consumers belong to the Third Tropic Level. Only about 10% of the calories in plant matter survive from First to the Second trophic level.
NON-FEEDING RELATIONSHIPS
1. Mutual relationships:
Relations between organisms can be
(a) mutually beneficial to both species, For example, relationship between flowers and insects is a mutually supportive relationship, or …
(b) Parasitic, in that such a relationship benefits only one party. Examples include ticks, fleas, mosquitoes, mistletoe plants and fungi.
Mutually beneficial relationships are also termed Symbiotic (sym = together, bio = living) and can be described as
a) Commensalism is a mutual interaction between two different species in which one organism benefits but the other is neither harmed nor helped in any way, or…
b) Mutualism is a type of species interaction in which both participating species benefit.
2. Competitive Relationships:
Plant and animal species compete over food, water, territorial space and mating with the opposite sex.
The Principle of Competitive Exclusion: explains that no two species can occupy the same niche (food or space) successfully in a stable community.
Closely related species therefore live far from one another. This is because plants and animals must compete for water, nutrients, light and space. The outcome of this competition determines the character of an ecosystem.