Ecological Succession Notes
Ecological Succession: Natural changes in the living area, that can be either primary or secondary.
Primary succession: Place without any soil.
Ex: flooding, landslides, side of volcanoes.
• Starts with lichens,
• Called pioneer species.
• It starts as lichens and forces of weather and erosion help break down rocks into smaller pieces. When they die they decompose adding organic matter to rock to make soil.
Lichens: Algae and Fungus
• Shade into
lerant species like grasses.
• In plants they reduce atmospheric carbon dioxide into organic carbon.
• Cells are photosynthetic.
• Help to break down hard substrate, providing nutrients to the soil.
• "Indicator species"
Primary succession: simple plants die, adding more organic material
• New land.
Secondary: Begins in a place that already has soil and was once the home of living organisms
• Occurs faster and has different pioneer species than primary succession
Example: after forest fires
Climax Community: stable group of plants and animal
End result of the succession process.
Primary succession: Place without any soil.
Ex: flooding, landslides, side of volcanoes.
• Starts with lichens,
• Called pioneer species.
• It starts as lichens and forces of weather and erosion help break down rocks into smaller pieces. When they die they decompose adding organic matter to rock to make soil.
Lichens: Algae and Fungus
• Shade into
lerant species like grasses.
• In plants they reduce atmospheric carbon dioxide into organic carbon.
• Cells are photosynthetic.
• Help to break down hard substrate, providing nutrients to the soil.
• "Indicator species"
Primary succession: simple plants die, adding more organic material
• New land.
Secondary: Begins in a place that already has soil and was once the home of living organisms
• Occurs faster and has different pioneer species than primary succession
Example: after forest fires
Climax Community: stable group of plants and animal
End result of the succession process.