Ecological communities

Ecological community

Trophic structures.

Producer: converts sunlight in energy, autotrophic

Consumer: primary, secondary, tertiary, quaternary

Detritivores: Feed on detriuts.

Decomposers: Recycle nutrients.

Types of species

Dominant species: Species that have high abundance relative to other species in a community, and have proportionate effects on environmental conditions, community diversity and/or ecosystem function.

Invasive species: An invasive species can be any kind of living organism that is not native to an ecosystem and causes harm.

Keystone species: Keystone species are those which have an extremely high impact on a particular ecosystem relative to its population.

Foundation species: Foundation species are habitat-forming organisms that define many ecosystems including coral reefs, hardwood forests, kelp beds, and seagrass meadows.

Community stability

Disturbance: Any event that changes a community.

Stability: ability of a community to recover from a disturbance.

Natural disturbances: include fires, insect outbreaks, disease epidemics, droughts, floods, hurricanes, windstorms, landslides, avalanches, and volcanic eruptions.