Section 1 Ecologists Study Relationships

Principles of Ecology Study Guide B Answer Key SECTION 1. ECOLOGISTS STUDY RELATIONSHIPS 1. Description: an individual living thing; Example: any individual organism, such as a moose 2. Description: a group of the same species that lives in one area; Example: any group of animals of the same species, such as a herd of moose 3. Description: group of different species that live together in one area; Example: any groups of different species that live in the same area, such as herds of moose and bison 4. Description: includes all of the organisms as well as the climate, soil, water, rocks, and other nonliving things in a given area; Example: any ecosystem, such as the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem 5. Description: a major regional or global community of organisms; Example: any biome, such as a temperate grassland 6. observation is the act of carefully watching something over time 7. direct surveys are used for animals that are easy to follow and involve watching animals with the naked eye or with tools such as binoculars or scopes; indirect surveys are used for species that are difficult to track and involve searching for other signs of an animal’s presence, such as looking for feces or a recent kill 8. Laboratory: benefit: able to control variables, drawback: experiments are performed in artificial settings that may not completely reflect a real setting; Field: benefit: more accurately reflects real conditions, drawback: harder to control all variables 9. scientists might want to use a model when their experiment is not practical to perform in real-time, such as when attempting to forecast how conditions might change in the future; models are also used to predict how changing one or more variables may affect future conditions 10. Ecology is the study of the interactions among living things, and between living things and their surroundings. 11. a biome contains both ecosystems and communities of organisms Principles of Ecology Study Guide B Name ______________________________ Class ___________________ Date __________________ Section 1: Ecologists Study Relationships Study Guide B KEY CONCEPT Ecology is the study of the relationships among organisms and their environment. VOCABULARY ecology ecosystem community biome MAIN IDEA: Ecologists study environments at different levels of organization. Write a description of each level of organization in the table. Also, provide an example for each level. Level Description Example 1. organism 2. population 3. community 4. ecosystem 5. biome MAIN IDEA: Ecological research methods include observation, experimentation, and modeling. 6. What is observation? _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ 1 Study Guide B Principles of Ecology Section 1: Ecologists Study Relationships Name ______________________________ Class ___________________ Date __________________ Study Guide B continued 7. What is the difference between direct and indirect surveys? _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ 8. Complete the following table with a benefit and a drawback of conducting an experiment in the laboratory compared with conducting an experiment in the field. Experiment Benefit Drawback Laboratory Field 9. When might a scientist use a model as a research method? _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ Vocabulary Check 10. What is ecology? _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ 11. Of the three terms, biome, community, and ecosystem, which term contains the other two? _______________________________________________________________ 2 Study Guide B Principles of Ecology Section 1: Ecologists Study Relationships