CHAE AND TIFF- UNIT TEST: Ecosystems

What are some examples of types of matter that cycle through Earth's ecosystem?

Water, air, and materials in the soil

How do plants get energy from the Sun?

When sunlight falls onto their leaves and is absorbed by green pigment in the leaves

What are some examples of decomposers?

Worms, bacteria, some insects, and fungi (mushroom)

Give an example of the previous question using a hawk, oak tree, and squirrel.

a squirrel is in a food chain with an oak tree and an animal like a hawk. Only a small portion (about 10% of the energy from a lower level makes it to the next level of the food chain above that level. That explains why only a very small about of energy makes it to the top of the food chain.

How do plants get the water they need?

absorb it through their roots

Examples of non-living things would include such things as...

air, water, and rocks.

An ecosystem includes...

all living things (producers, consumers, decomposers) in an area, and nonliving environment.

Give an example of the previous question. If your answer is similar to the answer provided, then you are correct

an animal like a lion eats meat. But the animals it eats, eat grass. And so you end up at plants each time you trace the flow of energy in a food chain.

What is at the top of the food chain?

apex predators

All living things go through _____________ that contain certain stages

basic life cycles

Why is it important to only change one condition at a time in an experiment?

because otherwise it would be confusing as to which condition caused the result.

What do decomposers and consumers release into the air?

carbon dioxide

What do plants take in from the air?

carbon dioxide

What does the air provide?

carbon dioxide

What do Carnivores rely on, regarding the food chain? And why?

carnivores rely on other animals in the food chain below their own level. Carnivores do not produce their own food.

Scientists believe that most dinosaurs starved due to the....

collapse of their food webs

What is a food web

combination of multiple food chains that show how the energy flows to animals

Any break down in the food chain can result in what?

death of other living things in the food chain that rely on the energy passing through the food chain (the underlined portion is important!)

Consumers

eat producers or other consumers

What do plants provide?

energy to animals that eat plants

What does the Sun provide?

energy to make plants grow

What is the primary source of the organisms of the material used to live and grow?

food

Where do plants get their minerals

from the soil

Why are decomposers important?

help keep the environment clean and help to recycle Earth materials by breaking down the wastes and remains of dead plants and animals

What do certain minerals do?

help plants grow

What is another term for primary consumers

herbivores

What does a food chain show?

how every living thing is linked to other living things by what it eats and what eats it. It shows a flow of energy

When you connect all the different food chains within one habitat, what happens to the diagram?

it looks more complicated (involved) BE CAREFUL: Some students might note that it resembles a web, and no longer just a straight line. Food webs show multiple chains connected to each other.

All in all, what are several basic requirements that plants need?

light, water, oxygen, carbon dioxide, minerals, and space

Plants are called what? and why?

Autotrophs because they make their own foods

What can plants make through the process of photosynthesis?

make sugar particles that they use for food.

How does Chlorophyll benefit plants?

Chlorophyll uses sunlight to change materials in water and air into food.

As the cycle of life progress from one step to the next, what is happening?

matter and energy flow through the living and nonliving parts of an ecosystem.

Where are Chlorophyll found?

plant leaves

Example of producers

plants

If you ask "What does each organism eat?" over and over. what do you always end up with?

plants

Sunlight

plants get energy from the sun.

Primary consumers eat...

plants to get their energy

Secondary consumers eat...

primary consumers to get their energy

Photosynthesis

process in which sunlight is changed into materials into energy and food for plants

Producers

provide the way that energy from the Sun enters an ecosystem

What does each arrow do?

should point in the direction of how material (matter) travels in each food chain

Food Web diagrams can be used to....

show the feeding relationships in an ecosystem.

What does a food web show?

shows that animals eat multiple types of food it also shows the flow of food (energy)

Why are small animals more likely to survive when food is scarce?

small animals could survive on less energy

How do plants get air?

taking it in through tiny holes in their leaves and stems

The carnivores would go extinct without what?

the Sun

In Food web diagrams, what do the arrows indicate?

the direction the energy and matter flow within an ecosystem

Where does the matter needed for a consumer to grow larger come from?

the organisms they consume as food

What happens when you put tape on the undersides of the leaves of a plant?

the plant could die, because it needs more air. I think that if you put tape on the undersides of a plant's leaves, the plant would die. I think this because I learned that a plant has tiny openings on the underside of its leaves (called stomata) which takes in air that it needs for its food.

What do consumers transform the matter they obtain into?

they transform the matter they obtain (along with air and water taken in from the environment) into building materials for their own bodies.

Stomata

tiny openings on the underside of its leaves

The nutrients converted from the decomposers are returned to where?

to the soil and the atmosphere, where producers can use them to begin a new matter cycle

Decomposers break down...

waste and dead material into nutrients for plants.

Through the decomposition process. matter from these materials is converted back into...

water and nutrients which are in the form of small, simple particles.

What do the plants use to make these particles?

water, carbon dioxide gas from the air, and energy from sunlight

What is the main source of energy for the entire food chain?

Sun

Where does the energy from the Sun flow through?

The energy from the Sun flows through the food chain to plants and animals

John released some pet frogs into the forest ecosystem shown above. These frogs eat earthworms and crickets. Hawks, robins, and squirrels do NOT eat these frogs. If the frogs start living here, the following would happen:

---The dead leaves will pile up because the frogs will eat all the decomposers. ---The decomposers will not be there to eat the leaves. ---The robins will not have anything to eat and they will need to find another food source or they will not survive.

What are five things that plants need to live and grow?

1. sunlight 2. water 3. air 4. minerals 5. space

Does a tree take in soil?

A tree may take in a little bit of soil. I know that plants take in minerals from the soil, using their roots.

Write out the stages of the basic life cycle in order

Growing-> reproducing-> dying-> decaying

Animals are called what? and why?

Heterotrophs because they do not make their own foods

True or False: The energy of every organism can be traced back to a producer as the source of that energy. If False, explain why.

False; The energy of every organism can be traced back to the SUN as the source of that energy.

True or False: Consumers start the cycle of matter. If False, explain why.

False; producers begin the cycle of matter

True or False: Food is not the way that matter is transferred from one organism to another If False, explain why

Food IS the way that matter is transferred from one organism to another

Do you think trees gains weight?

I know that a tree doesn't gain its weight from the soil because I saw an experiment where a scientist weighed a tree and its soil before and after the tree grew. The tree gained a lot of weight, but the weight of the soil barely changed.

Why isn't a fish tank a complete ecosystem?

It doesn't have decomposers to break down waste and dead material, or plants to use carbon dioxide and release oxygen. As a result, you need a water filter and bubbler to keep a fish tank healthy

What is another belief?

It is also believed that a volcano could have killed animals by cutting off sunlight in a given area. Blocked sunlight would also negatively affect the growth of producers (plants) in the food chain.

Using sunlight, water, and air, what can plants do?

Make their own food Use energy plus materials in the food and minerals from the soil to grow

Does mushroom and plant roots both grow in soil?

Mushroom roots and plant roots both grow in soil, but mushroom roots decompose dead leaves and other dead materials, while plant roots do not.

Explain the same as the previous question with: - omnivores - Decomposers - plants

Omnivores were more likely to survive because they could use many different sources of food, rather than depending on just one. Decomposers would have had lots of food sources from so many other animals dying. Plants would be more likely to survive than animals because they could use the small amounts of sun energy available, or survive as seeds!

Many scientists think that an asteroid caused the dinosaurs to go extinct. Claim: An asteroid impact caused the dinosaurs to go extinct. What are two pieces of evidence that support this claim? Make sure to explain your reasoning.

Possible evidence: -Scientists found a layer of asteroid dust in rocks all around the world. In younger rocks above that layer, there are no dinosaurs. The layer of asteroid dust shows that the entire Earth was affected by dust from an asteroid impact. It could have blocked the sun and caused the dinosaurs to go extinct, which is why we don't find dinosaur fossils in more recent layers of rock. -Volcanoes in recent history have erupted with so much dust and ash that they changed the earth's climate and caused a "year without a summer." If dust from volcanoes can cause temperatures to drop and plants not to grow, dust from an asteroid impact could have done the same thing. - A large crater was discovered in the Yucatán Peninsula, Mexico (Chicxulub Crater). Scientists dated the crater to near the end of the Cretaceous period. The crater at Chicxulub could have been the site where a large asteroid hit the Earth and caused the dinosaur extinction. Scientists have evidence that birds are direct descendants (relatives) of dinosaurs. It's likely that only non-bird dinosaurs went extinct at the end of the Cretaceous. T. rex got its energy from eating Triceratops. Triceratops ate green plants and green plants got their energy from the Sun. Carnivores would go extinct without the Sun because they get their energy from the Sun. Carnivores do not produce their own food or eat green plants, but the organisms that they do eat get their energy from green plants, which get their energy from the Sun. The energy of every organism can be traced back to the Sun as the source of that energy

Correctly show the flow of energy through a food web.

Producers → to consumers → to decomposers

If there are too many plants for the amount of sunlight, soil, minerals., or space, what happens?

Some of the plants will not survive

Why do scientists group mushrooms and mold together?

Scientists group mushrooms and mold together because mold has mushroom roots and is just a tiny, microscopic mushroom. Both of them break down dead things.

What is the reason to how dinosaurs went extinct based on what scientists think?

Scientists think that the dinosaurs went extinct because an asteroid may have hit the Earth and created a giant dust cloud that covered up the Sun and caused plants to die. (Blocking sunlight would cause plants to die.) killing the plants would in turn kill the animals relying on the plants.

What is another suggestion given by one of the videos you have watched in mystery science?

The video also suggested that an asteroid explosion could have created a tsunami which would have killed animals by flooding land in the area.

At the beginning of the cycle. what do producers do?

They convert water, air, and nutrients from the soil into sugars and other types of materials. After that, they use the materials to build structure such as leaves, stems, and roots

True or False: At any time, some organisms in a given environment are growing. Others are reproducing or dying. Some organisms have already died and are decaying If False, explain why.

True

True or False: The Earth's materials can be recycled in many ways. If False, explain why.

True