Energy Flow Among Organisms of a Food Chain in the Desert Essay

Ecology is how organisms interact with each other and the environment. The Lion King is linked to ecology by showing how organisms interact with each other and the environment. My three topics are how symbiotic relationships are important to a community, how limiting factors affect a community, how communities respond to abiotic or biotic factors, and how this is linked to the movie and Ecology. Symbiotic Relationships are interactions between two species and how they affect each other. There are three different types of symbiotic relationships Mutualism, Commensalism, and Parasitism.

In south Texas there are several types of ecosystems one of those ecosystems are the dunes. South Texas dunes are found along the Texas coastline and the general abiotic conditions are sandy soil, high salt content, some fresh water, flooding in the occasion of severe storms and moisture from rain and waves. Sea Oats and Bitter Pancum are two types of plants that dominate the South Texas dunes. Bitter Pancum adaptation for living in this type of ecosystem is that they are tolerant to high salinity. Sea Oats are less tolerant to high salt but their adaptation is to grow rapidly. Some common animal species that live in the dunes are crabs, which are tolerant to high salt water, gulls, and terns feed on crabs and other species around the

Plants are found everywhere on earth, up high on the ridge and down low in caves and caverns. The types of plants that live in these places depends on many factors. These factors are separated into two different categories, the biotic factors and the abiotic factors. Some of the biotic factors include, predation, competition, and habitat destruction. Plants with limited competition and large amounts of resources will be in a higher abundance than plants with limited resources and higher competition rates will be confined to areas and either out competed or will be the dominant species. Certain plants adapt to these factors and thrive and others don’t do as well. Some of the abiotic factors include, sunlight, water, temperature, and wind. These

However, they disagree on whether or not it is harming the wildlife populations in those areas. Terris says “roads and sprawling neighborhoods are replacing pristine wildlife habitats at an alarming pace, putting the survival and reproduction of plants and animals at risk.” Terris also believes it may be “the problem for U.S. wildlife in the 21st century”. (Terris) According to Terris, one victim of sprawl is the Florida panther, which has been reduced to a population of 30 to 50 adults. Furthermore, in the Sonoran Desert many plant species are affected, which also affects the animals that rely on those plants. She goes on to give numerous examples of animals and plants that are being harmed that spreads across the U.S., supporting the fact it is widespread.

When going to the sand dunes of the Illinois Beach State Park, we wanted to test the effects of different environment on succession, ecosystem development. The problem was to find out if there is a succession (ecosystem development) of plant communities taking place. If the sand dune’s closer to the lake are newer than those further inland, then, I believe succession will take place because the newest dunes do not have rich enough soil to support more complex plants like trees and shrubs growing in the areas that have already gone through later stage succession. The data supported our hypothesis.

One threat to the Mojave Desert today is off-road vehicles. These vehicles end up causing damage to wildlife and cultural resources. Unfortunately when these vehicles are driven throughout areas such as Johnson Valley, they cause damage the wildlife on the protected land. These off-road vehicles are driven recklessly and for the most part the driver will not stop. Consequently, the plant or animal that was in the way of the drivers course is crushed and dies. When this happens in areas like this, the while entire environment can be affected. One single plant or animal killed by an off-road vehicle starts begins a chain reaction of resource loss. These off-road vehicles are actually churning up the soil and this causes damage to the plant roots

Now, humans have a steady food supply so they do not have to move about. Therefore, people use fences to keep their animals in one place, which causes overgrazing. Today we see many subjects being affected by desertification. Ute Schaeffer reports the affects of desertification in, Down to Earth: News & Views on Desertification,“(doc.3) It has presented a challenge for governments and aid agencies in over 110 countries for some time, and is a contributing factor in poverty and regional conflicts, for example in Sudan. It has also been a major issue in Egypt, where 90% of the country’s land mass is desert. Faced with a rising population, the government has had to undertake a number of settlement and irrigation projects to create additional living and working space.” Necessary changes were made in order to adapt to the conditions of the desert and the obstacles that have to be faced. It is always presumed that there are only negative aspects to deserts but this isn’t always the case. There is a side to the Sahara desert that acts as a home to several living organisms. The Sahara has vegetation and access to water, which allows life to exist in this region. The Nile Valley, for example, is an area that is still quite full of foliage, trees and other growing things. This area is an exception, because of the way it is fed by the Nile River. Another area of the Sahara that has some vegetation to it is in the North, along the Mediterranean where olive trees grow

The Chihuahuan is the largest desert in North America-from southwestern United States all the way to Central Mexican Highlands. The Chihuahuan desert has something called the big bend region, which consists of important parts of the Rio Grande watershed in the United States and Mexico. This Amazing landscape is threatened by humans. People are living all in the desert and misusing the water supply, messing up the terrain with the overgrazing of cows and goats. The human population there is messing with the beautiful

The Chihuahuan desert is large area of the northern Mexico and runs into the southern part of the United Stated which include west Texas. The region of the desert has a high altitude of 1000 to 1500 meters which fall to about 350 meters along the Rio Grande River. Summers are very hot and the winter are somewhat cool, which some night frosts. Rainfall in this area is about 20-30 cm which mostly happens during the summer time. In most of the Chihuahuan Desert most of it has calcareous soil that are derived from the limestone beds. The Chihuahuan Desert has many types of vegetation such as Yucca, such as Torrey yucca or the banana yucca, they are very difficult in telling them apart because of hybridization, because they are

The texture of the soil is very dry. The soils are porous and can hardly hold any water. Moreover, it is considerably impermeable to any moisture. The Aridisols does not support plant life, but instead, it promotes minerals (Allen et al., 19). Their location is mainly in the desert areas. It is found in the far western part of the state of Texas. However, some little vegetation can grow on its topsoil. There are several minerals located in the aridisols namely gypsum, sodium, calcium and carbonate (Ettema et al., 45). Also, the soil provides the perfect texture for building the foundation of a structure.

As lack of water and a particularly dry climate out competes shrubs, trees, and grasslands across Colorado, erosion rates increase reducing the infiltration of moisture into the soil. Causation is believed to have come from heavy livestock grazing, fire suppression, and the introduction of exotic annual plants. Habitat problems for animals and communities that rely on ranching and hunting have been directly affected by these desertification effects. Desertification has had large ecological impacts on the state of Colorado. Vegetation and ecosystems are among the most crucially impacted by the effects of desertification. While Colorado continues its dry drought like climate, restoration of soil becomes one of the major solutions to fight off desertification. Because of the overuse of our land in past generations, we are continuing to see the harmful effects due to desertification. The overall impact on humans produced by desertification is best noticed by a diminishing food production as well as a wealth of water sources becoming dry. People in affected areas are likely to experience poor water quality, dust storms, and pollution. More importantly, as soil loses its nutrients, it no longer becomes farmable; thus, impacting local businesses, livestock, and the many people in that community. If desertification continues in Colorado, an increase of lost farmlands and livestock will pose an economic decease within agriculture markets, farmers will be forced to move to find better

In the course of this work , we have demonstrated the strong survival skills of the cacti in the Sonoran Desert. They take full advantage of the rainy seasons in the desert, and strengthen their ability of absorbing and storing water; they change their appearance to adapt to the arid environment by, for example, evolving the leaves into the spines; they adjust the photosynthesis by separating it into two steps. All these changes that the desert plants have made allow them to acclimatize to the harsh environmental conditions in the desert.

The defining character of a desert is usually low levels of rainfall with under 25 cm per year. Additional to that, the relationship between rainfall and the evaporated and transpired water must be taken into consideration. “A desert is a biological community in which most of the indigenous plants and animals are adapted to chronic aridity and periodic, extreme droughts, and in which these conditions are necessary to maintain the community’s structure” (Phillips, Comus, 2000, p. 10). This means that it is the environmental and climatic conditions that have created an evolutionary pressure for the flora to develop.

There are many beautiful plants in the desert. I loved spending time in the desert with my mom, it was quite and we got to enjoy it. The wildlife is a great experience and I'm excited to enjoy it more often. Animals is something I really enjoy watching, so it was interesting

Desertification is defined by Scott E Spoolman and G. Miller in their book Living in the Environment as “the conversion of rangeland, rain-fed cropland, or irrigated cropland to desert-like land with a drop of agricultural activity of 10% or more”. To put this as simple as possible desertification is turning usable soil into desert. Dissertation is hard to observe but over time