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Topic outline

 
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  • Time: 5 hours
    Level: Introductory

 
 

Introduction

  • Introduction Resource
  • This unit starts by looking at ecosystems and at some of the living and non-living components they contain. We will then move on to look at the importance of being able to identify and name the living...
 

1 The science of ecology

  • 1 The science of ecology Resource
  • Let us start by looking at some of the vocabulary involved. To study or understand anything we have to be clear about what the words we use mean. We will need these words to record what we have discovered,...
 

2 Ecosystems

  • 2.1 Where to start? Resource
  • There is a problem with any attempt to take an ecological approach to the biosphere as a whole. It is so incredibly complicated and diverse that it is difficult to know where to begin. The number of living...
  • 2.2 An example ecosystem: the rockpool Resource
  • Let's examine the concept of an ecosystem in more detail using an example that is familiar to many people: a rockpool on a British beach (see Figure 1).
  • 2.3 Black smokers Resource
  • I started with an ecosystem that is familiar and easy to visualise. Most people have seen a rockpool, if only on television. But many ecosystems remain undiscovered, and some of the ones we know about...
 

3 Making notes

  • 3 Making notes Resource
  • This section develops a useful study skill: making notes. The main scientific story then continues in the next section. Notes can be used for a number of things:
 

4 Identification and naming

  • 4 Identification and naming Resource
  • Before we can start to investigate how the organisms in an ecosystem interact with the environment we have to be able to give them names. The naming of living things has always had an important practical...
 

5 Interrelationships

  • 5 Interrelationships Resource
  • It is interesting to contemplate an entangled bank, clothed with many plants of many kinds, with birds singing on the bushes, with various insects flitting about, and with worms crawling through the damp...
 

6 Mapping interrelationships

  • 6 Mapping interrelationships Resource
  • Now we have started to identify the components of an ecosystem, living and non-living, we can start to look at ways of describing some of the interrelationships between them. As we have seen, one very...
 

7 Ecological health

  • 7 Ecological health Resource
  • Does all this matter? Why is it important to divide the biosphere into ecosystems and study the interrelationships they contain?
 

8 Summary

 

9 Next steps

  • 9 Next steps Resource
  • After completing this unit you may wish to study another OpenLearn unit, here are a few suggestions:
 

References and Acknowledgements

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