Heathlands: A Semi-Natural Environment

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

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.

The purpose of this experiment is to observe secondary succession at Umass Dartmouth and test the prediction that diversity increases through ecological succession. Students went outside to the lawn underneath the wind mill on campus. 3 transect sites were located by the instructor. Students predicted the species and percent cover of each species on each trail site. Bar charts were made to compare the number of species in each transect. Pi-charts were made to compare the percent coverage of species in each transect.

Biomes are appropriate conditions for organizing the natural world because the organisms that live in them common constellations of adaptations, particularly the climate of each of the areas and the characteristic vegetation types that develops in these divisions. It should be understood that the climate is perhaps the most important in determining classes of individuals who may live in an area and the ways they should be amended to live under different conditions of temperature and precipitation and seasonal distribution of these factors element. Every place on Earth has its own climate, influenced by both macroclimate regions as the particular microclimate. The soils are very important because they are essential to determine the types of plants that will grow into a bioclimatic zone in partical, in addition, also as substrates for animals serve. In turn, the soils are heavily influenced by regional climate, as well as the geology of the bedrock. At the same time we have to keep in mind the diversity of plants like the flora just like the diversity of the fauna as well as the adaptation of both.

The aim is to identify and associate landforms, rock types and soils to the natural environment and its plants and animals and also to investigate the history of the local environment, comprising human impacts over the last 50 years. The impact of human alterations to the environment includes increased soil erosion and changes in river flows.

There are many factors that account for the changes to the vegetation over time within ecosystems in the British Isles, such as human activity, climate, soil, light availability and intensity and natural disasters. The characteristics of the vegetation that are influenced by these factors are height, distribution, variety of species, adaptations and density of the vegetation. Some of these factors have relatively little influence on the succession development, whereas others have a dramatic influence over a long period of time, such as human activity. These factors, over time, result in the progression of a succession until the climatic climax vegetation is reached. However, sometimes these factors can mean that a plagioclimax is reached,

Ecological succession is the slow replacement of an ecological community by another, as one gradually overtakes another. Primary succession is when a landscape previously devoid of life starts to grow small shrubs, and eventually trees. Secondary succession is the replacement of life with more life. A pioneer species is the first species to begin primary succession. Climax communities are achieved in the last stage of succession, remaining unchanged until an outside event

Nectar and pollen attract a diverse collection of nectar fedding mammals and birds, these animals feed on inscets that are drawn by the great quantity of flowers located there. Heathlands are highly fire prone and the fire regime (frequency, intensity, and season of occurrence) has an enormous effect on composition and structure of habitat. Animals too are affected by this regime. Increasing time since fire may create a variety of habitats within the heath that suit different species, while mass post-fire flowering provides an abundance of food (Evvironment.NSW.gov.au). most of the plants in the heathlands produce large seeds that contain nutrients to make sure they establish even under the harsh conditions, this prevents spreading by wind or the feathers and fur of animals. This is overcome by specialised lipid- rich foods that are on the seeds, these lipid rich foods are food for ants, ants then collect the seeds and store them in their nests, they later then detach the foods from the seeds and discard the seed. This spreading and burial of the seeds protects them from intese bush fires and predators that eat seeds, this is still increasing moisture to soil. If the tweed council were to develop further it would decrease the flora that many animals and humans themselves rely

When looking at our recent investigation in the North West of Wales along the coastline, we specifically looked at the sand dunes in Harlech. We were looking at the how vegetation varied the further we go away from the sea, we predicted that we would see a larger proportion of vegetation the further we went from the sea as it is more suitable environment for vegetation to go and the only species present at the start would be the pioneer species of marram grass. There are many risks associated with this investigation and they will be outlined further in this essay.

Heathland is favoured where climatic conditions are typically hard and dry, particularly in summer, and soils acidic, of low fertility, and often sandy and very free-draining; mires do occur where drainage is poor, but are usually only small in extent. Heaths are dominated by low shrubs, 20 centimetres (7.9 in) to 2 metres (7 feet)

Several approaches have been used to solve issues in the different area of Canford Heath. Burning and cutting are common technique applied to target areas to reduce excessive vegetation. Burning is also applied in the extensive and inaccessible territory, whilst cutting is more effective on targeted and limited areas. Additionally, these two steps are followed by grazing to produce more mosaic vegetation of varying heights (White and Day, 2010). Grazing is also present in high-quality mires which are frequent in Canford Heat, especially in the valley bottoms and on spring lines (White and Day, 2010). Besides grazing, some mires are inaccessible and handwork such as cutting is the only remedy for management of such area. Cutting is also applied

When gathering data from the modern marsh, eight different quadrants that were 15 m apart from each other were examined for plant presence. The most vegetation diversity was observed in the mid-marsh region, with living and dead spartina, glass warts, and salt warts. Interestingly, there is a sharp shift from 71% spartina and 13% salt warts at 45m into the marsh to 93% salt warts and 7% spartina at 60m. These sudden shifts in plant type abundance throughout the marsh from the marsh border to 105m into the marsh (Figure -). Salt warts were the most copious, followed by spartina, and glass warts with the least occurrences in the marsh. One the marsh border, needle rush dominates with ~70% coverage, alongside sea oxeye, which also make a minor appearance 15m into the

Abiotic factors include soil pH and soil composition. Soil chemistry often vary geographically across very small areas. Soil composition can greatly impact local plant communities, some elements such as sodium, iron, and zinc are harmful to some plants but they could be beneficial to others. Different plants have different nutritional needs, some plants might need higher calcium amounts than others. Calcium is a secondary plant nutrient which

The definition of forest, mostly accepted as a group of trees of determined height, disposed in a determined density and covering some percentage of the soil, can be included in a broader definition of woodlands, often seen as a group of trees with more flexible thresholds for height, density and coverage. So, from now on and arbitrarily, when the word “woodland” is mentioned, “forests” are also included.

The health of the earth degrades with the destructive activity of human beings. A recent study by a group of scientists looked at twenty four different services that the earth’s ecosystems provide for humans, ecosystem services, and found that fifteen of them are in need of desperate help (Gazette 31 March 2005). These services are vital to the survival of both human and nonhuman life and include filtering water and providing nutrient rich soils and ocean waters. Many of the members of these various ecosystems are also decreasing in numbers. In a British survey of bird populations found that in the 200 birds of Britain tracked there was about a 54% population decrease between the 1968-1971 tacking period and the 1988-1991 tacking period. In two other surveys of 254 native plant species from the same area there was a decrease of about 28% during the past 40 years. Humans are pushing the sixth mass extinction (Gazette March 19, 2004).