a) Primary succession is the colonizing of a new environment that lacks organisms and plant life.

Secondary succession is the colonizing of an environment that once supported life but was
abandoned due to an ecological disturbance such as a fire, flood, landslide, lava flow, human
activity etc.
(So if the primary organisms (colonizers) are destroyed, the new organisms that eventually
inhabit that environment in their place is the secondary succession).
The primary succession refers to the original colonizers of an environment and the secondary
only come about if those primary organisms are destroyed.

b) i) * The trend is a general pattern that emerges from the graph.

So the trend here is a rapid increase from 50 to approximately 230 alligators between year 2
and year 3 followed by a drastic decline in the alligator population growth rate between year 3
and year 5 increasing just from 230 alligators to 250 alligators. The alligator population
plateaus (reaches stable equilibrium) at approximately 250 alligators for the following seven
years between year 5 and year 12.
ii)

So to determine the Carrying capacity simple draw a best fit straight line through the plateau
(stable equilibrium) to the y-axis.
So for the alligators this would give us a carrying capacity of approximately 250 alligators.

iii) This carrying capacity was reached in the 4th year.