DEFINITION OF TERMS

1. POPULATION
- is the number of organisms of the same species that live in a
particular geographic area at the same time, with the capability
of interbreeding.
2. COMMUNITY
- is a group or association of populations of two or more different species
occupying the same geographical area and in a particular time, also known as
a biocoenosis.
3. HABITAT
- place where an organism or a community of organisms lives, including all
living and nonliving factors or conditions of the surrounding environment. A
host organism inhabited by parasites is as much a habitat as a terrestrial
place such as a grove of trees or an aquatic locality such as a small
pond. Microhabitat is a term for the conditions and organisms in the
immediate vicinity of a plant or animal.
4. BIODIVERSITY
- the variability among living organisms from all sources including, inter alia,
terrestrial, marine and other aquatic ecosystems and the ecological
complexes of which they are a part; this includes diversity within species,
between species and of ecosystems.

5. LIMITING FACTORS
- is a resource or environmental condition which limits the growth, distribution
or abundance of an organism or population within an ecosystem. These can
be either physical or biological factors which can be identified through a
response of increased or decreased growth, abundance, or distribution of a
population, when the factor is changed and when the other factors necessary
to life are not.
6. CARRYING CAPACITY
- is the maximum population size of the species that the environment can
sustain indefinitely, given the food, habitat, water, and other necessities
available in the environment.
7. POPULATION DENSITY
- is the maximum population size of the species that the environment can
sustain indefinitely, given the food, habitat, water, and other necessities
available in the environment.