Biome Project

Relationships among the wildlife
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The following is a food web, showing a possible eating relationship between the animals and plants in the temperate woodlands.

foodweb.jpg

The arrows show what eats what. In order from bottom to top the trophic levels are as follows: producers->first level consumers->first level consumers->second level consumers->third level consumers(and in this case)top level consumers


A symbiosis is any relationship between two or more organisms. Examples:
-A bear eating berries.
-A mouse eating a seed.
-A flea living on a lynx.


There are four different types of symbiosises:

1. Mutualism-A symbiosis that is benificial to both of the organisms-Examples:
-Bumblebees collect pollon from various flowers. The bee benifits with the pollon that it gets, and the flowers benifit from the pollon that falls off the bee, spreading seeds for that will grow into more plants.
-Squirrels collect acorns. This gives them food, while spreading seeds for new oak trees.
-Birds and rodents help spread beech seeds. But they often take more than they can handle. Because of this, they end up leaving some in various places. Those seeds grow into new plants. The birds and rodents got food, and the seeds got spread.

2. Commensalism-A symbiosis that is benificial to one organism and doesn't affect the other one:
-A hawk building its nest on a tree branch. The bird gets a home, and the tree branch is uneffected by the presence of the bird.
-In spring, the queen bumble bees will fly around collecting nectar from pussywillows. The bee uses the nectar to make honey. The pussywillow is unneffected by this loss of nectar, however because the plant doesn't need it.
-Mice often live in the holes in trees. The mouse gets shelter from predators and the weather. The tree wasn't using the hole anyway, so it isn't effected.

3. Parasitism-A symbiosis that is benificial to one organism and harmful to the other-Examples:
-A tick is a parasite. It attatches itself onto a deer, and slowly sucks its blood out. The tick gets food out of the arrangement but the deer loses blood. Also, the deer can get a disease from it.
-Termites eat away at trees. This gives them food, but slowly kills the tree. They leave just enough wood for the tree to live.
-Carpenter ants, like termites, eat wood. They pose a natural threat to trees. They will eat the wood of a living tree and then live in the holes they made in the dying tree.

4. Predator/prey relations-A symbiosis that involves one animal consuming another-Examples:
-Puma consuming a squirrel. The puma is the predater, and the squirrel is the prey.
-Wolf consuming a hare. The wolf is the predater, and the hare is the prey.
-Bobcat consuming a deer. The bobcat is the predater, and the deer is the prey.

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