1. Mon. Tues. Wed. Thurs. Fri. Week of Sept. 22
Indoor lab – bring calculator
Week of
Sept. 29
Oct. 3
Exam 1
Wet outdoor lab – wear closed-toed shoes
Week of
Oct. 7
Indoor lab – bring calculator
Week of
Oct. 14
No labs – Fall Break

2. Outline
The biome concept
Survey of the biomes
Variability in Connecticut

3. Microclimate – climatic variation on a scale of a few kilometers, meters, or centimeters

5. Coniferous forest
Deciduous forest
Wetlands, Water
Residential, commercial
Lawn and turf

6. Environmental variability Applied Ecological Issues
Structure of course
Environmental variability
Organisms
Ecosystems
Populations
Species interactions
Communities
Applied Ecological Issues

7. What do organisms need to survive and reproduce?
Outline for organisms
Introduction
What do organisms need to survive
and reproduce?
How do organisms cope with variability?

8. Organism – fundamental unit of ecology; an individual living being bounded by a covering which separates it from its environment
Organismal approach – focus on how the organism interacts with its environment to survive and reproduce

9. Questions organismal ecologists ask
How does an individual’s form, physiology, and behavior help it to survive in its environment?
Why is the distribution of an organism limited to certain environments?
Why do related organisms in different environments have different characteristics?

10. What do organisms need in order to survive and reproduce?
energy
water
nutrients

11. Why do organisms need energy??

12. Fig. 2.8
All organisms use energy given off in oxidation
reactions
Difference is where they get the reduced compounds

13. Organisms have two different methods to gain energy
autotrophs - organisms that gain energy
from either sunlight (photosynthesis) or inorganic
compounds (chemosynthesis)
heterotrophs - organisms that use organic
materials (other organisms) as a source of energy

14. Types of heterotrophs
- herbivores - eat autotrophs
carnivores - eat other heterotrophs
detritivores - eat dead organic matter
- omnivores - eat more than one of the above

15. Why do organisms need water?

16. Fig. 2.8
Fig. 2.8

17. Fig. 2.9
Fig. 2.9

18. Why do organisms need nutrients?

19. Fig. 2.22
Fig. 2.22

20. INPUTS = STORAGE + OUTPUTS
Consumption = Metabolism + Egestion + Excretion +
Growth + Reproduction
INPUTS = STORAGE + OUTPUTS

21. Sooty tern
- nest on bare sand in very hot climate
eat squid and fish from local area
- nests are tended all of the time
Shearwater
- nest on bare sand or in burrows
eat squid and fish from far away
surface nests are often abandoned because
parents get too hot

22. Fig. 2.24

23. Niche: ecological role of a species in the community
- determines the range of conditions an organism can tolerate, how it feeds, how it escapes enemies, etc.
- no two species have the same niche

24. Habitat: the physical setting in which an
organism lives

25. Introduction and review of adaptation
Outline for organisms
Introduction and review of adaptation
What do organisms need to survive
and reproduce?
How do organisms cope with variability?

26. How do organisms cope with variability?
physiological adaptations
behavioral adaptations
developmental adaptations

27. Why do organisms have to cope with variability?
i.e., why does variability matter?

28. Fig. 9.4

29. behavioral - organisms can alter their behavior to stay within range of environmental conditions required to survive and reproduce

32. physiological - the physiology of an organism can change such that the range of environmental conditions it can tolerate changes
- reversible
- acclimation

33. Figure 9.9

34. Figure 9.10
blue = grown at 20 C orange = grown at 40 C

35. developmental - particular traits of an organism may be affected by the environmental conditions under which it develops
- irreversible