Background Knowledge & Context:
Why did I choose this topic?
Prerequisite: Students will need to know that there are many ecosystems on Earth, and that one change affects every other ecosystem. There are living and non-living things on this earth that interact with each other. These massive ecological areas span the globe, housing specialized organisms adapted to specific weather patterns, soil types, and environmental conditions.
Climate is the average weather of a place over many years... If you live in a place with a wet climate, you may be unhappy to see rainy weather, because your climate means that you get rain frequently. On the other hand, if you live in a dry climate where water is scarce, you might be very happy to see rainy weather. Earth’s climate causes humans to respond to various elements in a variety of way.4
They cover a large geographic area with biotic living things and abiotic factors such as climate, soil, air, altitude, precipitation, temperature, and latitude.
Rian is a form of precipitation, which is water that falls to the ground as rain, snow, sleet or hail. Temperature is a measure of how hot or cold the air is. Precipitation and temperature are the main ways to describe both weather and long-term climate.5
I chose this topic because it is included in the Next Generation Science Standards, which helps students know and prepare for the next grade level. Teaching the Biomes and the ecosystems requires research of the content. Biomes are large areas of the world characterized by their landscapes, animals, vegetation, and climates.
Regions on Earth that are made up of similar communities of plants and animals are called Biomes. An ecosystem is a group of plants and animals that depend on one another and their environment for survival. Biomes may contain a variety of ecosystems. However, biomes are sometimes called ecosystems. There are three types of ecosystems: forest, grasslands, and cold climate types.8
There are five major terrestrial biomes: forests, ranging from hot, humid tropical rainforests near the equator to cold boreal forests (taiga) in the north. They cover about 30% of the Earth's surface. Desert- the driest biomes, characterized by less than 50 cm (20 inches) of rain per year. They can be either hot or cold, requiring plants and animals to have high water-retention adaptations. Grasslands: open, flat terrain dominated by grass rather than large trees. Examples include the savannas of Africa and the prairies of North America.
The tropics or low latitudes are the areas between the Tropic of Cancer and the Topics of Capricorn. In the topics, the sun is overhead and nearly overhead all year long. In this region it is usually hot.
The temperate zone or middle latitudes are between the high and low latitudes. They have hot summers, a cold winter, and a moderate spring and fall.7
Tundra- the coldest biome, found near the poles or at very high altitudes. It features a short growing season, permafrost, and low-growing vegetation like mosses and lichens, and chaparral- regions with hot, dry summers and rainy winters, typically dominated by resilient shrubs and brushes.
Latitude Differences The polar zone, or high latitudes, are the areas north of the Arctic Circle and south of the Antarctic Circle. In the polar zones, the sun is near or below the horizon all year. Temperatures stay cool to bitterly cold.6
There are two aquatic biomes: marine- the largest on the planet. They include the vast saltwater oceans, coral reefs, and estuaries, and freshwater biomes- enclosed bodies of water with less than 1% salt concentration. Biomes cover large areas of land with their own climates and vegetation, spanning the globe. Examples include forest and grassland biomes. As I stated earlier, it has its own climate, temperature, terrain, plants, and animals. An ecosystem is a much smaller area within the biome. A biome can contain many different ecosystems. An ecosystem is much smaller and is defined by the plants, animals, and microbes that interact with one another; they also interact with the non-living abiotic components like soil, rocks, air, water, and other physical elements. An ecosystem involves the populations of different species living within a community. These species interact with one another to survive. There are two aquatic biomes: marine- the largest on the planet. These include lakes, ponds, rivers, and wetlands.
An ecosystem a healthy one can thrive for a long time. A strong healthy ecosystem is one that has a lot of producers at the bottom of the food chain pyramid. It is the producers that make an ecosystem thrive. Producers are the different plant communities that make an ecosystem work and thrive. The plants (producers) get their energy from the sunlight to create photosynthesis to make their own food and sugar to make food for primary consumers. Primary consumers are herbivores; they eat the plants. Then secondary consumers eat herbivorous animals to get energy from them. Then the Tertiary consumers come in and feed off the primary and secondary consumers. Then comes death and decomposition of the animals; fungi, worms, and bacteria help break it down, and the cycle returns to the earth. Death could come at any stage in the life cycle, but it does have to follow the process in death, decomposition so it can break it down and replenish the soil and life starts all over again
This is where the flow of energy in the food web comes into play, as it starts with the producers. Producers are the plant community that makes their own food. Ecosystems are the life-support systems of our planet. They regulate the climate, filter water, provide oxygen, and support biodiversity. Because all elements within an ecosystem are tightly interconnected, changes to even one species or physical factor can cause cascading effects throughout the entire system.
Ecosystems are the life-support systems of our planet. They regulate the climate, filter water, provide oxygen, and support biodiversity. Because all elements within an ecosystem are tightly interconnected, changes to even one species or physical factor can cause cascading effects throughout the entire system. In other words, it's the producers that make it possible for a variety of different species to thrive in an ecosystem.
Ecological Succession
I want my students to understand what ecological succession is, because every year in a certain area in our surrounding areas there are at least one or two forest fires. What will happen when a certain area is destroyed by a fire, flood, tornado and or human activity like deforestation? Ecosystem (or ecological) succession is the progressive, predictable process by which a biological community changes and develops over time. It typically unfolds in stages following the creation of a new habitat or a major disturbance, with each stage creating conditions that allow the next group of species to thrive.
There are several reasons an ecosystem or ecological succession can happen. There are two types of ecological successions one is primary succession and the other is secondary succession. I will describe secondary succession. In secondary succession, that means there was already a thriving ecosystem there before it broke down and was destroyed. The secondary succession is easier to recover from because the destruction is not as profound as starting from scratch like primary succession.
Secondary Succession
In secondary succession, the process to reach full climax community takes a shorter time, about half the time of primary succession. An ecosystem that is in secondary succession may take as little as fifty years to one hundred years to achieve full climax community in an ecosystem. The reason being is that these places already have the soil and the plants to regrow itself. It takes less time to achieve what it needs to than an environment that is starting from scratch. All the same processes in primary succession are the same for secondary succession. The weather breaks down the rock with rain and wind erodes the rock away. It won’t go back to its previous state but will become a different kind of ecosystem with a high level of biodiversity or diversity of species ecosystems. This process doesn’t happen overnight; it takes time for an ecosystem to return to a stable ecosystem, and that’s called an ecological succession.
Current theories about vegetation succession and food webs assembly are poorly compatible as food webs are generally viewed to be static, and succession is usually analyzed without the inclusion of higher trophic levels. In this study, we present results from detailed analysis of ecosystem assembly rule over a chrono-sequence of 100 years of salt marsh succession. First, using 13 yearlong observations on vegetation and soil parameters in different successional stages, we show that the space for time substitution is valid for this chrono-sequence.3
The wind and birds can bring over spores and seedlings and bacteria so moss, lichens, and fungi can grow. Moss, lichen, and fungi are pioneer producers, meaning they are the first producers that regrow and make the environment inhabitable. When these plants reach the end-of-life phase, they die and decompose and make more soil to grow more moss, lichen, and bacteria. They do this repeatedly so that the soil increases, and the environment makes it better for different kinds of small plants to grow. Then comes the small consumers that come with small predators.
The intermediate phase comes with grass, shrubs, plants, and small trees and animals that are slightly bigger than the animals that were in the pioneer producer and consumer stage. The last and final stage is the climax community. That is when an ecosystem is fully thriving again and can support all the consumers' needs and the environment has biodiversity in it. This process takes about one hundred to one hundred fifty years, maybe even two hundred years, to reach a climax community.
Successions can happen from a natural disaster like a tornado, hurricane, wildfire, floods, and human activity like deforestation. An ecosystem is made up of biotic and abiotic factors and in an ecosystem that has been destroyed by natural disasters or human activity. A community must start back all over again starting with lichen and moss with tiny incest and small animals in the herbivores. After lichens and moss grow, small plants and animals start to populate the area.
Early Succession is the only period when tree canopies (including herbs and shrubs), complex food webs, large nutrient fluxes, and high structural and spatial complexity. Different disturbances contract markedly in terms of biological legacies, and this will influence the resultant physical and biological conditions, thus affecting successional pathways.1
Primary Succession
In primary succession, an ecosystem is starting fresh with no plants present. Primary succession happens when a volcano erupts and lava spills out over the ground and covers the ground with lava. When that lava dries and cools down, it becomes a bare rock. Or when a glacier melts and land that was once frozen is now able to grow moss and lichens at first, that small plants colonize the lava fields, just like when glaciers melt. It doesn’t happen quickly, especially for places that have rocky ground. The weather breaks down the rock with rain and wind erodes the rock away.
The wind and birds can bring over spores and seedlings and moss, lichens, and fungi can grow. Moss, lichen, and fungi are pioneer producers, meaning they are the first producers that regrow and make the environment inhabitable. When these plants reach the end-of-life phase, they die and decompose and make more soil to grow more moss, lichen, and bacteria. They do this repeatedly so that the soil increases, and the environment makes it better for different kinds of small plants to grow. Then comes the small consumers that come with small predators.
The intermediate phase comes with grass, shrubs, plants, and small trees and animals that are slightly bigger than the animals that were in the pioneer producer and consumer stage. The last and final stage is the climax community. That is when an ecosystem is fully thriving again and can support all the consumers' needs and the environment has biodiversity in it. This process takes about one hundred to one hundred fifty years, maybe even two hundred years, to reach a climax community.
In primary succession, this is where a new piece of land is made from a volcano eruption or a glacier melts, and land is finally exposed. It wasn’t there before it was formed like when a volcano erupted lava spilled over it and when it cooled down and hardened it became nothing but rock. They want to see large progress in the replenishment of trees.
The ecological importance of early successional forest ecosystems (ESFEs) have received little attention, expect as transitional phase, before resumption of tree dominance. In forestry, this period is often called the “cohort re-establishment" or “stand initiation” stage, with attention obviously focused on tree regeneration and re-establishment of closed forest canopies.2
These pioneer producers die and decompose, and more lichen and moss grow the cycle happens repeatedly, again until the soil gets thinker. And other small plants began to grow, and other consumers came along with their predators to come. Little by little as the years and decades pass, the producers grow bigger and more different plants and trees grow. The diversity of the ecosystem grows and becomes solid. This process of ecological succession happens over a course of hundred to one hundred fifty years for it to become a climax community. We should keep in mind that it does not go back to the previous ecosystem, but somewhat the same because it doesn’t have the same exact vegetation and consumers. Most of the same consumers returned, but not all. Primary succession takes a lot longer than time to get an ecosystem back to full climax community; it would take twice as long to get in back to full capacity which is 150 to 200 year to get it back to full working order where the ecosystem has biodiversity.
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