Biodiversity and Sustainable Ecosystems

• Ecosystems must maintain balance (aka "equilibrium")
• Biodiversityis the number of various populations present at any ecological level.
  • Low diversity = fewer populations
  • High diversity = more populations
  • Biodiversity is important because more species means bigger food chains and bigger food webs.
    • More producers = more food for primary consumers = more food for secondary consumers & more oxygen!
    • More species and room for adaptations creates bigger gene pools
    • More ecosystems means more habitat

Not another nature film from teeb4me on Vimeo.

• Sustainability is meeting today's ecosystem needs without compromising tomorrow's ecosystems.

Population Dynamics

• Natality rate - frequency of births in a population per capita
• Mortality rate - frequency of deaths in a population per capita
• Carrying capacity - the maximum number of individuals that an ecosystem can support

7 Factors that Affect a Population:

1. Natality rate
2. Mortality rate
3. Hunting and predation
4. Starvation and accidents
5. Loss of habitat
6. Human development
7. Weather

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If you want to print a PowerPoint version of this lesson:

Here are the questions to answer and hand into Ms. Harris:

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March 27th, 2012

• Watch all three of the videos Ms. Harris posted above. (Feel free to watch them a couple of times).
• Think about "Biodiversity" and "Sustainability"... think about how they impact you.
• Write a one-page report on your thoughts on the topics of "biodiversity" and "sustainability".
  • How do they impact your life?
  • What do you think about the sustainability of the Earth? Can we keep doing what we're doing?
    • What do you think will happen if the Earth decided to stop trying to be "eco-friendly".
• THIS WILL BE SUMMATIVELY GRADED.