Science Common Sense
1123 - How do different environmental conditions affect the types and distribution of organisms and their food relationships to form different ecosystems
Imagine the Earth is like a big puzzle, and each piece is a special place with its own living things, like plants, animals, and tiny organisms. These living things and their homes are called ecosystems. Now, let's see how different conditions affect the puzzle pieces:
Temperature: Some plants and animals can only live in very hot or very cold places. For example, penguins live in cold Antarctica, while cacti live in hot deserts.
Water: Some places have lots of water (like oceans), while others have very little (like deserts). This affects which plants and animals can live there. Fish live in water, but camels live in deserts.
Light: Plants need sunlight to grow. Some places have lots of sunlight (like beaches), while others have very little (like caves). This affects which plants can live there.
Soil: Some plants need special soil to grow. For example, plants that live in rocky mountains need strong roots to hold on.
Now, let's talk about food relationships:
In an ecosystem, each living thing is connected to others through food. For example:
- Plants make food from sunlight.
- Herbivores (plant-eaters) eat plants.
- Carnivores (meat-eaters) eat herbivores.
Different ecosystems have different food relationships because of the living things that live there. For example:
- In the ocean, phytoplankton make food from sunlight, and fish eat phytoplankton.
- In the forest, plants make food from sunlight, and deer eat plants.
So, different conditions create different ecosystems with unique living things and food relationships.