Environmental Factor affecting Population

Biotic factors

Population ecology
Lecture 10
 Lecture Outcomes

At the end of this lecture the student will be able to:

• Determine the different types of environmental factors.

• Distinguish between different biotic factors and its affects in population.
 The biotic environment
Biotic factor is any living component that affects the population of another organism, or the environment.

Types of Interaction
• The biotic environment is experienced by an individual as interactions with other organisms.

• These will Include Individuals of the same species (Intraspecific effects) and Individuals of many other
species (Inter- specific effects).

• Throughout its life an individual will come into contact with many other organisms. Within any
community there will be a complex interplay of relationships both within and between species.

• The way in which organisms fit together in a community and react to each other is fundamental to the
understanding of the community and therefore of basic importance in ecology.
 Intraspecific relationships (within species)

Reproduction:
• One of the first stages in sexual reproduction is the location of a mate.

• The selection of a mate often includes competition between individuals of the same sex, either males for
females or more rarely females for males.

• In red deer, for example, males fight for females. In other species males compete without fighting and
females choose the one which they see as most attractive, this is common in bird species where the males
are colorful.
 Intraspecific relationships (within species)

Care of offspring

• Offspring are usually cared for by their parents by the female only, for example in

mammals like the red deer, or by both parents for example in many birds where both

parents my hunt for food to feed the nestlings.

• Care of offspring includes feeding, guarding, keeping them warm and transporting

immature individuals.
 Intraspecific relationships (within species)

Competition:
• This occurs between individuals within a species for environmental
resources such as food, space, light, water and mineral nutrients.

• In both animals and plants, competition can occur at any time during the
life cycle, between sperm or actively growing pollen tubes for the
chance to fertilize an egg, between seedlings for light and space.

• between adults and between adults and young for example between trees
and the seedlings on the woodland floor or between male lions taking
over a pride and the young cubs of the previous.
 Interspecific relationships (between species)

Reproduction:
• Pollination in many angiosperms and a few gymnosperms involves a more mobile
species as pollen transporter.
• Such carriers include insects, birds, slugs, bats and a few other mammals.
• The pollinator benefits by receiving nectar or pollen, the plant benefits by being
pollinated with pollen from another individual.
 Interspecific relationships (between species)

Care of offspring:
• Care of offspring by another species is rare.

• The larva of the large blue butterfly (Maculinea arion), after feeding
on thyme (Thymus) drops to the ground where it is found by
Myrmica ants. The ants take a sweet substance from a honey gland
on the larva and the larva is then carried by ants to their net.

• Here the butterfly larva eats ant larva and hibernates in the safety of
the nest.
 Interspecific relationships (between species)

Care of offspring:
• Another more familiar example are the
European cuckoos (Cuculus spp.) which lay
their eggs in the nests of small birds s as the
meadow pipit. The offspring are then reared by
the owners of the nest.
 Interspecific relationships (between species)

Mutualism:
• Where both the organisms gain benefits by long-term association with each other the
relationship is said to be mutualistic.

• Often one of the organisms gains food and the other protection. for example some ant
species live in the specially swollen bases of thorns on some Acacia trees.

• The ants obtain a home and defend the tree by attacking insects which they finder on
the tree, the tree gains protection for its leaves.

• Trees such as beech, oak and pine gain amino acids from fungal associations, the fungi
in return receive carbohydrates and vitamins from the tree.

• also nitrogen-fixing bacteria in root nodules.

 Interspecific relationships (between species)

• Commensalism:
• It is a relationship between two organisms of different species in which
one derives some benefit while the other is unaffected.
• The species that benefits from the association—may obtain nutrients,
shelter, support, or locomotion from the host species, which is unaffected.
• Pseudoscorpions hitching ride on a fly’s (Diptera) leg .
• The remora (family Echineidae) that rides attached to sharks and other 
fishes.

www.discoverlife.org/nh/tx/Arachnida/Scorpionida
 Interspecific relationships (between species)

Parasitism and disease:

• Parasitism occurs where individuals of one species live or reproduce using the food and
other resources of an individual of another species, Often with a noticeable detrimental
effect on the host.
• The relationships between parasites and hosts are many and varied.
• Some parasites live within the host (endoparasites), others live outside the host
(ectoparasites)
 Interspecific relationships (between species)

Predation :
Apart from autotrophs all organisms have to feed on other organisms.
• Herbivores, insectivores and carnivores are all individual in interspecific interaction.

• The evolutionary pressures on predators to be good at locating and consuming their prey,
and on potential value to be good at avoiding being eaten, causes a constant struggle
between individuals of both species for survival. resulting in dynamic co-evolution.
 Interspecific relationships (between species)

• Predator and Prey:

• Predation describes an interaction where a predator
species kills and eats other organisms, known as prey.
• Sometimes, predators themselves become prey.
• Praying mantis captures.

• Anole captures and eats praying grasshoppermantis.

 Interspecific relationships (between species)

Protection:
• Many organisms attempting to avoid predation use other organisms for protection,
for example insects bide under tree bark, birds nest in holes in plants to protect
their young.

• Some organisms gain protection from predation by using the defense mechanisms
of another species, the cinnabar moth caterpillar eats the poisonous ragwort plant
(Senecio jacobaea) and concentrates the plant's toxins in its tissues.

• The caterpillars are brightly coloured with black and yellow stripes to warn birds
that they are unpleasant to eat.
 Interspecific relationships (between species)

Competition:
• Competition between individuals of different species
is probably extremely important for determining the
abundance, health, reproductive capacity and
distribution of species within a community.
• Competition probably occurs for all the limited
environmental resources such as food, space, light,
pollinators, water and minerals.
 Interspecific relationships (between species)

Defense:
• Organisms respond to predation, parasitism and competition by using
defense mechanisms.
• These include mechanical defenses such as sharp spines on cacti (protecting
the plant, which contains a store of water, from thirsty desert animals) and
hedgehogs and toxic substances which kill or deter grazing animals.
• Sometimes toxins are produced by plants to kill other plants in the
surrounding vegetation
 Biotic and abiotic interactions

The complexity of the environment.

• The interlocking effects of the abiotic and biotic environment are many and complex.
• The physical environment will always exert an effect directly on the organisms In a community.
• Day, night, ruin, drought, cold, high winds, all these factors will affect the Individual, and,
because of this, they will also affect its interactions with other organisms. and therefore, the
biotic environment.
• Any biotic factor which alters the distribution or abundance of a particular species will also
affect the abundance and distribution of its predators and so on throughout the food web.
 Biotic and abiotic interactions

Pathogens and climate:

• Many disease seem to be associated with climatic conditions.

• Changes in abiotic environment can influence the severity of outbreaks of diseases in three main ways:

• By weakening the host, by providing favorable conditions for the pathogen and by affecting the behavior of the

transmitter of the disease if one exists.

• An example of host weakness increasing the effectiveness of the pathogen occurred during the unusually hot

summer of 1976. The very high temperatures of the summer of 1976 came at the end of a long period of 16 months

drought which killed many plants outright. Many which survived were severely weakened, most notably trees.
 Biotic and abiotic interactions

• Pathogens and climate:

• In some cases, a disease organism is transmitted from one species to another or within a
species from one organism to another by a third organism known as a vector.
• Many vectors are insects.

• A change in the number or behavior of vectors caused by environmental conditions will

alter the occurrence of the disease it carries,.
 Biotic and abiotic interactions

Abiotic effects on competition:

• Any physical factor such as water, soil pH, temperature and light which affects the growth of an organism will change its
competitive ability within a community.

• Competition is one of the most important biotic effects of the environment and any factor, either biotic or abiotic, which alters
the competitive ability of an organism, either beneficial or harmful will be extremely important in determining the distribution of
individuals in the community.

• In many cases a species does not grow or range over the whole area where the physical environment is suitable for survival, it
may be that the species is being excluded from part of its range by another species (competitive exclusion).

• The occurrence and causes of competitive exclusion are not easy to prove.

• In the marine shore environment, where there is constant disturbance and battering by waves, competition for space on rocks to
which organisms can attach themselves to prevent being washed away is strong.
 All species are influenced by biotic factors in one way or
.another

• For example, if the number of predators will increase, the whole food web will be affected as the
population number of organisms that are lower in the food web will decrease due to predation.
• Similarly, when organisms have more food to eat, they will grow quicker and will be more likely to
reproduce, so the population size will increase.
• Pathogens and disease outbreaks, however, are most likely to cause a decrease in population size.
Humans make the most sudden changes in an environment (e.g. building cities and factories, disposing
of waste into the water). These changes are most likely to cause a decrease in the population of any
species due to the sudden appearance of pollutants.
 H.W.
Complete the following table by using (+) for positive effect, (–) for negative
effect and (0) for no effect?
Two species interaction
Response of species (B) Response of species (A) Types

Competition

Predation

Mutualism

Parasitism

Commensalism:
  Chapter 9 from the book:
◦ Chapman and M.J. Reiss
◦ Ecology: Principles and
Lecture references: Applications.
◦ Some electronic website

 By: D/ Dalia Gabr