Ecosystems &

Ecology Chapter 4
Y7 text
Year 7 Biological Science
Science Understanding
• investigating Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples' responses to the disruptive interactions of invasive
species and their effect on important food webs that many communities are a part of, and depend on, for
produce and medicine
• using food chains to show feeding relationships in a habitat
• constructing and interpreting food webs to show relationships between organisms in an environment
• classifying organisms of an environment according to their position in a food chain
• recognising the role of microorganisms within food chains and food webs
• investigating the effect of human activity on local habitats, such as deforestation, agriculture or the introduction
of new species
• exploring how living things can cause changes to their environment and impact other living things, such as the
effect of cane toads
• researching specific examples of human activity, such as the effects of palm oil production in Sumatra and
Borneo
Key terms
• Ecology • Populations • Cellular • Detritivores
• Community respiration • Niche
• Ecosyste
• Producers • Autotrophs • Interspecific
m competition
• Consumers • Heterotrophs
• Biotic • Intraspecific
• Food webs • Herbivores competition
factors
• Food • Carnivores • Parasitism
• Abiotic chains • Omnivores • Mutualism
factors • Photosynth • Commensalism
• Decomposer
• Habitat esis • Trophic level
s
• Organis
Ecosystems
• An ecosystem is a geographic area
where plants, animals, and other
organisms, as well as weather and
landscapes, work together to form a
bubble of life.
 Organisms
An organism refers to a living thing that has an organized
structure, can react to stimuli, reprduce, grow, adapt, and
maintain homeostasis.
An organism would, therefore, be any animal, plant, fungus,
protist, bacterium, or archaeon on earth.
The two major groups are the single-celled (e.g. bacteria,
archaea, and protists) and the multicellular (animals and plants).
Organisms can also be classified according to their subcellular
structures. Those with a well-defined nucleus are referred to as
eukaryotes whereas those without are called prokaryotes.
Biodiversity
• Biodiversity comes from two words Bio meaning life
and diversity meaning variability.
• Biodiversity is the variety of all living things; the
different plants, animals and micro organisms, the
genetic information they contain and the ecosystems
they form.
• Biodiversity is usually explored at three levels -
genetic diversity, species diversity and ecosystem
diversity. These three levels work together to create
the complexity of life on Earth.
Ecosystems
• Ecosystems are made up of living things
(biotic factors) and non-living things
(abiotic factors) that interact with each
other.
• Organisms such as bacteria, worms, birds,
plants and snakes are examples of biotic
factors.
• Examples of abiotic factors include water,
temperature, pH, salinity and light
intensity. Within an ecosystem, there are
interactions between the biotic factors
and between the biotic and abiotic factors.
 • A habitat is the place or location within the ecosystem
where an organism lives. For example, the habitat of a
frog may be a pond, for a scorpion it may be the desert
and for a fish it may be the ocean.
Habitats • An organism’s habitat provides it with appropriate
environmental conditions (such as light intensity and
temperature) and essential resources, such as food,
water, oxygen and shelter.
The Balance of Abiotic Factors
• Each species has a tolerance range for a particular abiotic factor. Within
this range, the optimum range is the range in which the organism
functions best.
• Abiotic factors within habitats can influence not only the types of
organisms located in them, but also where they are found within the
habitat and how many there are.
• The term ‘distribution’ describes where organisms are found and ‘density’
is the number of a particular organism in that area.
• Determining the distribution and density of particular types of organisms
within habitats can be very useful.
• Information about the distribution and density of endangered species or
unwanted introduced species within habitats may be used to plan
appropriate protective or reduction strategies.
Patterns, order and organisation of biotic factors
ACTIVITY
• Complete the Practical: Modelling Ecosystems
Activity
• Complete the Marine ecosystems worksheet
Interacting Atoms
• Cells are made up of components that, in turn, are made up of molecules.
These molecules are made up of atoms.
• Many of these atoms cycle through living and non-living parts of ecosystems.
In the carbon cycle, for example, carbon atoms may be taken in by plants in
the form of a carbon dioxide molecule to use in the process of
photosynthesis.
• When animals eat the plants, these atoms can then be used or incorporated
into animal tissue. When organisms use a process called cellular respiration,
carbon-containing glucose molecules are converted into a form of energy
that their cells can use. Carbon dioxide is a waste product of this process and
is released back into the surroundings.
Nutrient
Cycles
The Water Cycle
•Water, warmed by energy from the sun,
evaporates from lakes, rivers, oceans and the
soil surface to form water vapour in the
atmosphere.
•When the water vapour condenses into large
droplets, rain falls on both land and water
bodies.
•When rain soaks into the soil it becomes
soil water. This water is found between the
grains of soil and is taken up by plants.
• As it passes through plants, some of the
water molecules are involved in the process
of photosynthesis. The rest of the water
The Water
Cycle
The
Nitrogen
Cycle
The
Carbon
Cycle
Relationships in
Ecosystems
Relationships in ecosystems
• Living (biotic) and non-living (abiotic) things that interact with each
other in an ecosystem
• For example, plants use energy from the sun, some animals eat the
plants, and some animals eat other animals. It is through feeding
relationships that energy flows through ecosystems and a variety of
atoms that make up matter can be recycled.
Levels of organisations
• An organism is the simplest form of life. It may be made up of a single
cell (unicellular) or many cells (multicellular). Organisms that can
interbreed and produce fertile offspring are members of the same
species.
• Organisms of the same species living in the same place at the same
time are called populations.
• A group of populations that live and interact with each other in the
same area is called a community.
• An ecosystem is made up of a community and its physical
ACTIVITY
• Complete the Practical: Living, non-living and dead
Activity
• Complete the TBQ questions 4.2: 2-6 & 12
 Plants and Plants are Most These
Producers plant-like
organisms
known as
the
producers
convert
sugars are
known as
are always producers light biological
found at the of an energy molecules
bottom of a ecosystem from the and are
food chain Sun into stored in the
as they only sugars leaves,
need air, (stored stems and
water, chemical roots of a
sunlight energy). plant.
Consumers
• Animals cannot use the Sun’s light energy to survive
• Animals must eat to get the energy they require to survive and are
thus called consumers.
• The energy consumed by eating is then used to stay alive – to pump
their blood, move their muscles, operate their nerves and to grow
• In a food chain, the consumer that only eats producers (plants) is
called a first-order (primary) consumer
• The animals that consumes the first-order consumer is then called a
second-order (secondary) consumer
• The animals that consumes the second-order consumer is then called
a third-order (tertiary) consumer
 Herbivores
Some animals do not eat other animals.
They survive on plants and are known as
“herbivores”.
Carnivores
Some animals, like the kingfisher, eat only
other animals. These animals are called
“carnivores”.
Omnivores
• Some animals, like us, eat both plants and
animals.
• These animals are called “omnivores”.
Prey & Predators
• A predator eats other animals.Predator
• Predators that are not prey to
other predators in a food chain
are known as apex predators. Prey
• Any animal which is hunted
and killed by another animal
for food is prey.
Decomposers
• Decomposers are responsible for recycling nutrients in an
ecosystem.
• They convert organic matter into inorganic matter. This is
the reverse of what producers do.
• Decomposers obtain their energy and nutrients from dead
organic material. This includes dead organisms and their wastes
(such as faeces and skin flakes). As they feed, they break down
the organic matter chemically into simple inorganic forms or
mineral nutrients.
• Their wastes are then returned to the environment to be recycled
by producer organisms.
• This recycling of matter from one form to another within
ecosystems is key to their sustainability.
What are relationships between species?

THE RELATIONSHIPS THAT IN THESE INTERACTIONS EACH

OCCUR BETWEEN BIOTIC BIOTIC SPECIES MAY BE
SPECIES ARE KNOWN AS NEGATIVELY IMPACTED,
ECOLOGICAL RELATIONSHIPS. POSITIVELY IMPACTED OR
UNAFFECTED BY THE
Competition
• When species or individuals “fight” for the same resources.
• The “fight” may be indirect … individuals may never directly contact
each other.
• E.g., Food, shelter….
• Two species with similar needs for same limited resources cannot coexist.
• KEYSTONE PREDATOR/SPECIES
• A predator that causes a large increase in diversity of its habitat.
• Losing a keystone species usually disrupts many ecological relationships.
Herbivory

• A primary consumer feeds on a producer.

A woodchuck eating
wild clover
A fruit bat eating
a papaya
Predation
• A consumer feeds on another consumer.

A lion eating zebra.

An eagle eating halibut.
Symbiosis
• A long-term relationship
where two species live
closely together and at
least one benefits directly
from the relationship.
Mutualism
• Both organisms benefit
from the relationship.
• Win-Win situation!
Commensalsm
• One organism benefits, the other one is
unaffected.
• Win-Neutral relationship
Parasitism
• One organism benefits, the other one is
harmed!
• Win-Lose relationship
• Parasites rarely kill their hosts…it would
require them to get another one!
Activity
• Complete the TBQ 4.3: 2-6, 10, 11 & 14
ACTIVITY
• Complete the Practical: Observing leaf epidermal cells
Food Chains
• Food chains are used to show the flow of food, or energy, in
an ecosystem. Knowing which animals eat what can be very
useful, particularly when considering the impact humans
have on their surrounding environment
• A food chain arrow always points towards the animal
doing the eating - for example a centipede eats a wolf spider,
meaning the arrow will point toward the centipede (i.e. Wolf
Spider  Centipede)
• The direction of the arrows shows the flow and movement
of energy in an ecosystem (meaning the Wolf spider
provides energy for the centipede to grow and move)
 Level 4
Tertiary consumer sun
Food chains
top carnivore
• Trophic levels Level 3
• feeding relationships Secondary consumer

• start with energy from carnivore

the sun Level 2
Primary consumer
• captured by plants
• 1st level of all food chains heterotrophs
herbivore
• food chains usually go Level 1
up only 4 or 5 levels Producer

• inefficiency of energy transfer

autotrophs
• all levels connect to
decomposers Decomposers
Fungi

Bacteria
 secondary
consumers loss of
sun (carnivores)
energy

Energy flows
through primary consumers
(herbivores) loss of
ecosystems energy

producers (plants)
 What is your
ecological
footprint?!

Humans in
food chains
• Dynamics of energy through
ecosystems have important
implications for human
populations
• how much energy does it take to
 Food chains represent the flow of
energy (food) through an ecosystem

Draw a food chain in your book

representing the relationship
Problem between a mountain water skink
(lizard), a feral cat, a noisy miner
bird and berries & fruit
Remember to label the producer
and the primary, secondary and
tertiary consumers (remember to
draw your arrow in the direction of
energy flow)
Food Webs

In the wild, animals may eat more than one

thing, so they belong to more than one food
chain.
To get the food they need, small herbivores may eat
lots of different plants, and carnivores may eat many
different animals.
Food Webs
We can show this by using a food web, which is just a more
complicated version of a food chain.

owl fox

rabbi mice
ts

grass seeds berrie

Broken Chain
Breaking
the Chain
• Organisms living in a habitat
depend on each other.
• If one part of a food chain dies
out or is greatly reduced, the
consumers have to find
alternative food, move away, or
starve.
• This then affects more
consumers in the same way.
Endangered or Extinct?
• The number of people in the world is growing at an
alarming rate.
• But this is not true for all animals.
• In some cases, there are only a few of one type of animal
left in the wild.
• These animals are endangered.
• If they die out completely, they become extinct.
Why does this happen?
There are lots of reasons why animals become endangered
or extinct.
The most common are:
• loss of habitat (woodlands cut down, rivers drying up,
hedgerows removed).
• chemicals or pollution poison the animals.
• hunting (for sport, their fur, tusks or meat).
Caring for the
Environment
• It is in our own best interests to look after the
world we live in.
• If a habitat is lost or damaged, it has an effect
on everything else, even if we do not see or
understand it straight away.
• Remember - once something becomes
extinct, it’s gone forever!
Biological Magnification
• Increasing concentration of poisons in organisms in higher trophic levels in a food
chain or web.
• The accumulation of increasing amounts of toxin within tissues of organisms can
cause significant harm to an organism.

Many
toxins
in the
Many person
toxins
in the
water
Biomagnification
Energy flows
• The initial source of energy
for our ecosystems is the
Sun.
• Producers capture some of
this light energy and convert
it into chemical energy using
the process of
photosynthesis.
• When consumers eat
producers, some of this
Trophic levels
• Each feeding level is called a trophic level. Food chains can be defined
as a pathway along which food is transferred from producers to one
trophic level and then to the next.
• Primary producers make up the first trophic level and the consumers
(herbivores) that eat them make up the second trophic level.
Consumers eating these herbivores make up the third trophic level and
consumers eating these consumers make up the fourth trophic level.
Trophic levels
• Energy is not recycled, nor can it be created or destroyed.
• Energy is transformed from one form to another. At each level in the
food chain, some energy is also released to the environment in other
forms (such as heat, kinetic and sound energy).
• As only about 10 per cent of the chemical energy is passed from one
trophic level to the next, most food chains do not usually contain more
than four trophic levels. There is also a limit to the number of
organisms that can exist at each level.
Order in chains
• Look at the food chain below:
• The grass is the primary producer.
• The consumer that eats the producer is called a primary consumer
(grasshopper).
• The consumer that eats a primary consumer is called a secondary
consumer (frog).
• The consumer that eats the secondary consumer is a tertiary consumer
(snake).
GRASS GRASSHOPPER
ACTIVITY
• Complete the Food Chains and Food Webs worksheet
Human Impacts on
Ecosystems
Human Impact on Ecosystems
• Man impacts environments for a number
of reasons:
• Food production – agriculture and wild
harvest
• Energy production
• Pollution
• Together these activities stress
ecosystems
• Stress leads to a reduction in species
Deforestation
Overfishing
Human Impact on Ecosystems – Food
Production
• “The battle to feed humanity is over. In the course of the
1970’s the world will experience starvation of tragic
proportions – hundreds of millions of people will die.” – Paul
Ehrlich, The Population
We now time
have more food Bomb,
than 1968.
ever before
- Improved irrigation and farming methods
- High yield crops
- Fertilizers & pesticides
What Cost?
Effects of Intensive food Production-Problems

• Monoculture
• growing a single species over a large area – trees/
food crops
• Loss of habitat including increase in field size for
efficiency
• Reduces species diversity
• Loss of nutrients – leaching due to soil erosion
• Invasion of opportunistic weeds
• Intensification of disease/ predation problems
• Loss of soil structure due to inorganic fertilisers leads to
topsoil erosion
Effects of Intensive food Production - Solutions

• CHEMICALS
• Herbicides (weedkillers, natural/ synthetic)
• Pesticides (insecticides & fungicides natural/synthetic)
• Fertilisers (NPK & organic)
• DIFFICULTIES
• Toxicity (to consumer & non target species)
• Bioaccumulation through food chain (leading to toxicity)
• Resistance requiring stronger chemicals
• Persistence
• Pollution (leaching/ runoff)
Examples - Fertilisers
• Fertilisers (organic or NPK)
• Eutrophication excessive nutrients into water (deoxygenation)
• Nitrate in water – blue baby syndrome due to nitrite oxidation of
haemoglobin
• Cancer – not certain
Examples - Pesticides
• Pesticides can be toxic to man and other species
• DDT/DDE – synthetic oestrogen
• thin egg shell - birds of prey
• altered sex ratio (small penis, testicles
• RATS, alligators, fish
• Link to breast cancer
• Fall in sperm counts (controversial - sex more often)
• Organic farmers better sperm quality (Denmark)
Examples - Herbicides
• Kill indiscriminately
• Good & bad weeds killed
• Loss of food/ habitat for variety of animals
• Loss of food web diversity – unstable
• Loss of useful insect etc. species
• Loss of soil improving microbes/ animals
• Possibly toxic
Increasing Energy Needs
• Energy requirements have increased
• Principally they have been met by polluting fossil fuels
• This has lead to carbon dioxide emissions increasing
substantially

Carbon dioxide causes GLOBAL

WARMING
Global Warming
• Principally due to carbon dioxide (60%)
• Other gases include
• Methane (20%)
• CFCs (14%)
• Nitrogen Oxides (6%)
• Ozone (upper atmosphere) (8%)

• Carbon dioxide has increased by 31% during industrial

revolution
• Increase due to combustion, deforestation
Climate change solutions
• Change of 0.6°C over last century
• Projected rise 1.5 ° -4.5 ° C
• Not all due to Carbon Dioxide, sunspot activity
• Solutions
• Reduce fossil fuel combustion
• Switch to alternative fuel sources (renewable)

Conserve forests
Add iron to sea
Global Warming Problems
• Coral bleaching
• Loss of photosynthetic algae (zooxanthellae) from
commensal relationship due to 1°C increase in sea
temperature
• Disease spread
• Malaria possible in south britain
• Loss of species’ niches
• e.g. arctic species on cairngorms

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/hadleycentre/models/modeldata.
html
Food production
needs to double to
meet the needs of an
additional 3 billion
people in the next 30
years

Climate change is projected to decrease

agricultural productivity in the tropics
and sub-tropics for almost any amount
of warming
Other Pollution from combustion of fossil fuels

• Acid rain (SO2, Nox)

• Other pollutants
• PM 10s - Asthma

• Ozone layer
• CFCs activated by high energy photons
• Chlorine free radicals react with ozone in upper atmosphere
 Pollution
• Heavy metals
• Interfere with enzyme action/ biochemical processes
• Result of industrial activity, common at foundry sites/ gas works
• Can be removed by expensive soil cleaning
• Reeds may be able to concentrate and so remove them in their
tissues
Pollution - biotransformation
• Biotransformation is when organisms metabolise
chemicals into different chemicals. Typically this
is a detoxification process.
• Sometimes less toxic chemicals are changed into
more toxic chemicals
• e.g. – metallic mercury to very toxic methyl mercury
• Minamata bay, Japan
Pollution - Biomagnification
• If a pollutant is not excreted or destroyed by an organism, it
will concentrate in the animal’s body.
• If that animal is subsequently consumed, all of the toxin will
pass to the consumer
• Consequently, the consumer will have a higher concentration
of toxin in their body.
• HCB = hexachlorbenzene
Correlation between DDE concentrations in the eggs of Alaskan falcons and hawks and
reduction in the thickness of their eggshells (compared with shells collected prior to 1947).
DDE is a metabolite of DDT. Data from T. J. Cade, et. al., Science 172:955, 1971.

Average Reduction in
Species Location Concentration Shell
of DDE in Eggs (ppm) Thickness
Alaskan tundra (north
Peregrine falcon 889 -21.7%
slope)
Peregrine falcon Central Alaska 673 -16.8%

Peregrine falcon Aleutian Islands 167 -7.5%

Rough-legged Alaskan tundra (north
22.5 -3.3%
hawk slope)
Gyrfalcon Seward Peninsular, Alaska 3.88 0

http://www.ourstolenfuture.org/Basics/chemlist.htm
 Tributyl Tin

• Anti fouling chemical (now banned) used to prevent build up

on ship’s hulls
• In higher concentrations can lead to changes in molluscs e.g.
dog whelks/ oysters
• Sex ratio changes/ bifurcate penis
Human Impacts
• “Love Canal”
• housing estate near Niagara falls, built on chemical dump (dioxin,
benzene)
• Low birth weight and growth retardation
• Canal
Fighting climate change with fire
• Before viewing, answer these questions:
• How do bushfires affect climate change?
• What do you know about trees and carbon?
• Have you heard of the Mimal Rangers and the work they have been doing?

• Click View:
https://online.clickview.com.au/exchange/series/58745315/the-first-inventors/video
s/59209581/story-3-fighting-climate-change-with-fire
Fighting climate change with fire
• After viewing, answer these questions:
• Why is it important to reduce fuel loads?
• How can good fire management be a solution for climate change?
• What are your thoughts on the Mimal Rangers doing this work for 25
years and it not being Australia wide yet?
Fighting climate change with fire
• Write a response to the following:

• Should we be using the carbon reduction program of the Mimal

rangers throughout Australia to reduce fuel loads and wildfires that
dump an enormous about of carbon into the air? How would this
benefit the communities around Australia at risk of wildfires every
year?

• Use the resources on the following slides to help inform you piece.
How trees capture and store carbon
Australian wildfires released more CO2 than annual
emissions of Germany