1. Ecological Succession Have you ever wondered how life starts in a new area? Succession means when one organism __________ from another. One king would succeed the previous _____.
takes over
king

2. Ecological Succession
Description
Illustration
Starts out as bare rock
Moss and lichen spores (seeds) get blown in on the wind. (First species = Pioneer species)
Moss and lichen slowly break down the rock into soil.
Small plants and grasses start to grow in the soil. They block the sunlight and kill the mosses.
Time

3. Ecological Succession
Description
Illustration
Shrubs and bushes take over from the grasses.
Softwoods (fast growing trees) take over from the shrubs and bushes.
Hardwoods (slow growing trees) take over from the softwoods.
Time

4. Ecological Succession The hardwood trees act as the _______ (largest) community. The environment will stay like this until something _____ the trees, and then it will start over again. Sometimes (after a forest fire, etc) there’s already soil so the process can also start without the _______________.
climax
kills
pioneer species

5. Glaciers What’s a glacier
Glaciers What’s a glacier? Glaciers are large bodies of ice that move slowly across a landscape, stripping it down to the bedrock.

6. Glaciers Answer the following questions:
1. What is left after the glacier melts?  
2. What organisms are the first to grow on the rocks?
3. How is soil made?
4. Which organisms are the next to grow?
5. What about the environment makes these organisms grow well?
6. What organisms are the next to grow?
7. What change happens due to these organisms?
8. What do you think would happen if a forest fire burned the forest down? What organisms would colonize the environment first? Why?

7. Ecological Succession
Try the rest on your own!

8. Sneak Preview!__________________
Exit Slip:
Ecological Succession
Homework:
Sneak Preview!__________________
Climate Change