BIO3141: Animal Ecology and

Behaviour
Content
Unit 1: Introduction to Ecology and Biosphere
Unit 2: Population Ecology
Unit 3:Community Ecology
Unit 4: Ecosystem Ecology
Unit 5: Environmental issues
Unit 6: Environmental management
Unit 7: Animal Behaviour
Unit 1: Introduction to Ecology
and Biosphere
 Introduction
 Organisms are open systems that interact continuously with their
environment

 The scientific study of the interactions between organisms and their

environment is ecology, from the Greek “oikos” which means “home”
and “logos” which means “to study”.

 These interactions determine both the distribution of organisms and

abundance, leading to three questions that ecologists often ask about
organisms:
Where do they live? (distribution)


 Activity 1

• The science that studies the interaction between living organisms is

called………………..

• This science is multidisciplinary. Discuss.

• What is its application in real life?

 Ecologists also study how interactions between organisms and the
environment affect phenomena such as:
 The number of species living in a particular area,
 The cycling of nutrients in a forest or lake and
 The growth of populations in a give area

 Application in real life

 Ecology reveals (Tells) the richness of the biosphere and can
provide the basic understanding that helps us to conserve and
sustain that richness, now threatened more than ever by
human activities.

 This chapter introduces the science of ecology and describes

some of the factors, both living and nonliving, that affect the
distribution of organisms.

 It also surveys the major types of aquatic and terrestrial

 Activity 2
• Give any two methods used by ecologists?
• Using examples explain in not more than three lines how these
methods are used
 Concept 1:Ecology is the study of interactions between
organisms and the environment
1. Ecological research methods and materials
• Humans have always had an interest in the distribution and
abundance of other organisms
• As hunters and gatherers, prehistoric ( ancient) people had to
learn where game and edible plants could be found in
abundance
• With the development of agriculture and domestication
of animals, people learned more about how the environment
affects the growth, survival and reproduction of plants and
animals
• Later naturalists from Aristotle to Darwin and beyond
observed and described organism in their natural habitats and
systematically recorded their observations.
• Because extraordinary insight can still be gained through this
descriptive approach to discovery science, natural history
remains a fundamental part of the science of ecology
• In addition to this long history as a descriptive science, ecology
is also a rigorous experimental science where Ecologists
conduct modern ecological research using observation,
experimental and modeling methods
• During the research processes, ecologists use a wide
range of tools and techniques to study the living world
such as binoculars, field guides, sampling techniques to
assess changes in plant and wildlife communities; DNA to for
molecular studies, radio tags to track migrating wildlife or use
data gathered by satellites to support actual scientific research
methods.
• Observation method: It is based on the ecological question such as: “what
species live here? How many individuals of each species are there?
• Experimental method: Experiments can be used to test hypothesis. For
example, ecologists often test the hypothesis through field experiments
such as the measure of the impact of herbivory on plant species diversity
by comparing open control plots to experimental exclosures designed to
keep out certain herbivore species. Experimental methods can be:

1. Manipulative experiments which are those in which the

researcher alters a factor to see how it affects an ecosystem. It
is possible to do this in the field or in a laboratory
Example: If you wanted to learn about lizard predation of
spiders, you could alter the number of lizards in enclosures and
study how many spiders resulted from this effect.
 2. Natural Experiments:

• Natural experiments, as their name implies, are not directed by humans.

These are manipulations of an ecosystem caused by nature.

• The main difference between manipulative and natural experiments from a

data perspective is that natural experiments do not have controls. Therefore it
is sometimes harder to determine cause and effect.

• Modeling method : Ecologists make models to gain insight into complex

phenomena such as effects of global warming on ecosystems.

• Many ecological models consist of mathematical formulas based on data

collected through observation and experimentation and the predictions made
by ecological models are often tested by further observations and
experiments.
• ax+b= y
 2. Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
 Ecology and evolutionary biology are closely related because, based
on the Darwin’s extensive observations of the distribution of organisms
and their adaptation to specific environment, the environmental
factors interacting with populations could cause evolutionary change.
 Today, there is ample evidence that events that occur in the
framework of ecological time (minutes, months, years) translate into
effects over the longer scale or evolutionary time (decades, centuries,
millennia).
 For example, hawks feeding on field mice have an immediate
impact on the prey population by killing certain individuals,
thereby reducing population size (ecological effect) and altering
the gene pool (evolutionary effect).
 One long – term evolutionary effect of this predator – prey interaction
may be the selection for mice with fur coloration that
camouflages the animals
 3. Organisms and the environment
• The environment of any organism includes abiotic (nonliving
components – chemical and physical factors such as
temperature, light, water, space, and nutrients) and biotic
(living components – all the living organisms) that are
part of their individual’s environment.
• Organisms may compete with other individuals for food and
other resources, prey upon it, paralyze it, provide its food, or
change its physical and chemical environment.
• Questions about the relative influence of various
environmental components, both abiotic and biotic, are
frequently at the heart of ecological studies
• For example, by considering the geographic range of x species in
a given area, two common ecological questions are:
What environmental factors limit the geographic range or
distribution of x species?
What factors determine its abundance
• Always in the case of x species, we may find that:
 Some climatic factors like hot and wet seasonal drought
are required.
We might find once again that it lives in shaded – dark
brown to orange, where the climate is drier and more
variable from year to year
We might find also that the climate influences X species
populations through biotic factors such as pathogens,
parasites, competitors, predators and food availability.
• This is the reason why ecologists need to consider multiple
factors and alternative hypothesis when attempting to explain
 4. Subfields (Levels) of Ecology
4.1. Organismal ecology
• It concerns how an organism’s structure, physiology and behavior
meet the challenges posed by the environment.
• It may be subdivided into the disciplines of physiological ecology,
evolutionary ecology, and behavioral ecology.
4.2. Population ecology
• A population is a group of individuals of the same species living in
a particular geographic area.
• Population ecology concentrates mainly on factors that affect how
many individuals of a particular species live in area.
4.3. Community ecology
• A community consists of all the organisms of all species that
inhabit a particular area; it is an assemblage of populations of
many different species.
 Thus, community ecology deals with the whole array of
interacting species in a community.
• This area of research focuses on how interactions such as
predation, competition and disease as well as abiotic factors
such as disturbance, affect community structure and
organization.
4.4. Ecosystem ecology
• An ecosystem is the community of organisms in an area and
the physical factors with which those organisms interact.
• An ecosystem consists of all abiotic factors in addition to
the entire community of species that exist in a certain
area.
• An ecosystem such as a lake, wetland, forest, river, pond… may
contain many different communities
 4.5. Landscape ecology
• It deals with arrays of ecosystems and how they are arranged in a
geographic region.
• Landscape ecology is the study of the pattern and interaction
between ecosystems within a region of interest.
• A landscape is part of Earth's surface that can be viewed at one time
from one place. It consists of the geographic features that are
characteristic of, a particular area ( E.g. mountains, plains ( savanna ,
glassland….) and plateaus)

• Every landscape or seascape consists of patch, corridor and matrix.

• The mosaic (Mixture) of different types of patches; an environmental
characteristic is referred to as patchiness by ecologists.
• Landscape ecological research focuses on the factors controlling
exchanges of energy, materials, and organisms among the ecosystem
patches making up a landscape or seascape.
• The examples of the landscape are a corridor of trees lining a river
flowing through a sparsely vegetated plain.
Patch:
A relatively small area that has
distinctly different structure and
function than the surrounding
landscape.

Corridor:
A linear patch typically having
certain enhanced functions due to
its linear shape (see box on next
page).

Matrix: The background within

which patches exist.
Biological or hierarchical scales : Continue
from here
• The Biosphere is the global ecosystem defined as the sum of
all planet’s ecosystems.
• This broadest area of ecology includes the entire portion of
Earth inhabited by life:
the atmosphere to an altitude of several kilometers
the land down to and including water – bearing rocks at least
3 kilometers below - ground,
lakes and streams, caves, and the oceans to a depth of
several kilometers.
• An example of research at the biosphere level is the analysis of
how changes in the concentration of carbon dioxide in
atmosphere may affect Earth’s climate and, in turn, all life on
Earth
 Concept 2: Interactions between organisms and the
environment affects the distribution of the species
• Ecologists have long recognized global and regional patterns in
the distribution of organisms within the biosphere.
For example, gorillas exist in mountainous areas of
Northern Rwanda, West DRC, and Eastern Uganda and not in
Tanzania, Kenya, Ethiopia…
• More than a century ago, naturalists began to identify broad
patterns of distribution by naming biogeographic realms.
• Biogeography provides a good starting point for understanding
factors limiting the geographic distribution of species.
• Ecologists might arrive at a such understanding through the
series of questions like in the following chart:
Flowchart of factors limiting geographic distribution
 2.1. Dispersal and distribution
• The dispersal is the movement of individuals away from centers of high
population density or from their area of origin contributing to the global
distribution of organisms.
When organisms expand their range by moving into areas where they
did not exist previously; this is called natural range expansion
When intentionally or accidentally a species is introduced in the areas
where it was previously present, it is called species transplants
When individuals seem to avoid certain habitats, even when the habitats
are suitable, their distribution are limited by habitat selection
behavior.
• There are various reasons for this- competition
Looking for better sites
Moving out of disturbance
Looking for mates….
• The advantages of this are:
increased survival for the species
 2.2. Biotic and abiotic factors
• In many cases, a species cannot complete its full life cycle if
transplanted to a new area due to the biotic factors
• This inability to survive and reproduce may be due to
negative interactions with other organisms in the form of
predation, parasitism, diseases or competition for resources.
• Survival and reproduction may also be limited by the absence
of other species on which the transplanted species depends.
• For instance, the absence of particular pollinator species may
stop the reproduction of the transplanted plant species.
• However, the global distribution of organisms broadly reflects
the influence of abiotic factors such as regional differences in
temperature, water availability, sunlight intensity…
 1. Temperature
• Environmental temperature is an important factor controlling
the distribution of organisms due to its effect on biological
processes
cells may rupture if the water they contain freezes (less
than O0C)
proteins of most organisms denature at temperatures
above 450C
• In addition, few organisms can maintain and appropriately
active metabolism at very low or very high temperatures
2. Water
• Living organisms can not survive without water
water fills cells to help maintain shape and structure
water inside many cells creates pressure that opposes
 Freshwater and marine organisms live submerged in aquatic
environments, and most are restricted to either freshwater or
saltwater habitats by their limited ability for osmoregulation
Terrestrial organisms face a nearly constant threat of
desiccation, and their global distributions reflects ability to
obtain and conserve water
Desert organisms exhibit a variety of adaptations for water
acquisition and conservation in a desiccating environment.
3. Wind
• It amplifies the effects of the environmental temperature on
organisms by increasing heat loss due to evaporation and
convection.
• It contributes to water loss by increasing the rate of evaporative
cooling in animals and transpiration of plants.
• It can have a substantial effect on the morphology of plants by
inhibiting the growth of limbs on the windward side of trees
 4. Sunlight
• It provides the energy that drives nearly all ecosystems, although
only plants and other photosynthetic organisms use this energy
source directly.
• Light intensity is not the most important factor limiting plant
growth in many terrestrial environments, although shading by a
forest canopy makes competition for light in the understory
intense.
• In aquatic environments, the intensity and quality of light limit the
distribution of photosynthetic organisms.
• It is also important to the development and behavior of many
organisms that are sensitive to photoperiod, the relative lengths
of daytime and nighttime.
• Photoperiod is more reliable indicator than temperature for cuing
seasonal events such as flowering by plants and migration by
 5. Rocks and soil
• The physical structure, pH, and mineral composition of rocks
and soil limit the distribution of plants and thus of the animals
that feed upon them, contributing to the patchness of
terrestrial ecosystem
• In streams and rivers, the composition of the substrate can
affect water chemistry which in turn influences the resident
organisms
• In freshwater and marine environments, the structure of the
substrate determines the organism that can attach to or
burrow in it.
 2.3. Climate variability and climate change
• Four abiotic factors – temperature, water, sunlight and wind –
are the major components of climate, the prevailing
weather conditions in a particular area
• Climatic factors, particularly temperature and water, have major
influence on the distribution of organisms
• The climate is described on two scales:
Macroclimate: patterns on global, regional, and local level
which are largely determined by the input of solar energy and
the planet’s movement.
Microclimate: very fine patterns, such as those encountered
by the community of organisms underneath a fallen log
OR
Any climatic condition in a relatively small area, within a few or
less above and below Earth’s surface and within canopies
 2.3.1. Macroclimate
a) Global climate patterns
• Earth’s global climate patterns are determined largely by the
input of solar energy and the planet’s movement in space.
• The sun’s warming effect on the atmosphere, land, and water
establishes the temperature variations, cycles of air movement,
and evaporation of water that are responsible for dramatic
latitudinal variation in climate.
b) Regional, local, and seasonal effects of climate
• Proximity to bodies of water and topographic features such as
mountain ranges create regional climatic variations, and smaller
features of the landscape contribute to local climatic variation
• These regional and local variations in climate contribute to the
pithiness (goodness) of the biosphere
• Let us note that seasonal variation is another influence on
 Latitudinal Variation in
Sunlight Intensity
• Earth’s curved shape causes
latitudinal variation in the
intensity of sunlight.
• Because sunlight strikes the
equator perpendicularly, the
most heat and light per unit of
surface area are delivered
there.
• At higher altitudes, sunlight
strikes Earth at an oblique
angle, and thus the light
energy is more diffuse on
Earth’s surface.
• Latitude: the angular distance
of a place north or south of
 Seasonal Variation in
Sunlight Intensity
• Earth’s tilt (obliquity) causes
seasonal variation in the
intensity of solar radiation
• Because the planet is tilted on
its axis by 23.5°C relative to
its plane of orbit around the
sun, the tropics (regions that
lie between 23.5°C north
latitude and 23.5°C south
latitude experience the
greatest annual input of solar
radiation and the least
seasonal variation
 2.3.2. Microclimate
• Many features in the environment influence microclimate by
casting shade, affecting evaporation from soil and changing wind
patterns.
• For example, forest trees frequently moderate the microclimate
below them
• Consequently, cleared areas generally experience greater
temperature extremes than the forest interior because of greater
solar radiation and wind currents that are established by the rapid
heating and cooling of open land; evaporation is generally greater
in clearings as well.
• Within a forest, low – lying ground is usually wetter than high
ground and tends to be occupied by different species of trees
• A long or large stone shelters organisms such as worms, and
insects buffering them from the extremes of temperature and
moisture
 3. Long – Term climate variation and climate change
• Temperatures on earth should remain within a range suitable for life
because the biosphere has a natural atmosphere.
• Carbon dioxide, methane, water vapor and other atmospheric gases
trap heat energy and maintain earth’s temperature range.
• These gases function like the glass windows of a greenhouse. Just
as the glass keeps the greenhouse plants warm, these gases trap
the heat energy of sunlight inside earth’s atmosphere.
• The natural situation in which heat is retained by this layer of
greenhouse gases is called greenhouse effect. The major causes
of past climate change are:
Changes in the Earth’s orbit,
changes in the sun’s intensity,
volcanic eruptions,
changes in greenhouse gas concentrations
changes in ocean currents
• Greenhouse gases allow solar energy to penetrate the
atmosphere in the form of sunlight.
• Much of the sunlight that hits the surface of our planet is
converted into heat energy and then radiated back into the
atmosphere
• However, those same gases do not allow heat energy to pass out
the atmosphere as readily as light energy enters.
• Instead, the gases trap heat inside earth’s atmosphere.
• If these gases were not present in the atmosphere, earth would
be 300C cooler than it is today
• Since 1850, there has been a considerable change in climate
elements: temperature, precipitation, sea levels, atmosphere
(changes in greenhouse gases, aerosols) atmospheric and
oceanic circulations leading to a considerable variation and
climate change.
• Climate change is a significant and lasting change in the
statistical distribution of weather patterns over periods ranging
from decades to millions of years
• Climate variation is a change in the statistical distribution of
weather patterns over periods less than decades
• Naturally, climate change is caused by biotic processes such as
variations in solar radiation received by earth, and volcanic
eruptions
• Currently, it is amplified by certain human activities such as fossil
fuel burning added to the natural causes of climate change, have
also been identified as significant causes of recent climate
change, often referred to as “global warming” .
 Concept 3: Abiotic and biotic factors influence the
structure and dynamics of aquatic biomes
• Aquatic biomes account for the largest part of the biosphere in
terms of area, and all types are found around the globe
• Ecologists distinguish between fresh water and marine biomes on
the basis and physical and chemical differences.
For example: marine biomes generally have salt concentration
that average 3%, whereas freshwater biomes are usually
characterized by a salt concentration of less than 1%
The largest marine biomes, the oceans, cover about 75% of
Earth’s surface and thus have an enormous impact on the
biosphere.
• The evaporation of water from the oceans provides most of the
planet’s rainfall, and ocean temperatures have a major effect on
world climate and wind patterns.
• In addition, marine algae and photosynthetic bacteria supply a
substantial portion of the world’s oxygen and consume huge
amounts of atmospheric carbon dioxide.
• Freshwater biomes are closely linked to the soils and biotic
components of the terrestrial biomes through which they pass
or in which they are situated.
• The particular characteristic of a freshwater biome are also
influenced by the patterns and speed of water flow and the
climate to which the biome is exposed
• Many aquatic biomes are physically and chemically stratified
for both a lake and a marine environment as illustrated on the
following figure.
• The limnetic zone is the open and well-lit area of a freestanding body of
freshwater, such as a lake or pond.
• Light is absorbed by both the water itself and the photosynthetic organisms in it, so its
intensity decreases rapidly with depth.
• Ecologists distinguish between the upper photic zone, where there is sufficient light for
photosynthesis, and the lower aphotic zone, where little light penetrates.
• pelagic zone refers to the water column, where swimming and floating
organisms live.

• At the bottom of all aquatic biomes, the substrate is called the benthic zone.
• Made up of sand, organic and inorganic sediments, the benthic zone is occupied by
communities of organisms collectively called benthos.
• A major source of food for benthos is dead organic matter called detritus, which rains
down from the productive surface waters of the photic zone.
• The deepest regions of the ocean floor are known as the abyssal zone.

• Thermal energy from sunlight warms surface waters to whatever depth the sunlight
penetrates, but the deeper waters remained cold. As a result, water temperature in lakes
tends to be stratified.
• In the ocean and most lakes, a narrow stratum ( layers) of rapid
temperature change called thermocline separates the more
uniformly warm upper layer from more uniformly cold deeper
waters.
• In both freshwater and marine environments, communities are
distributed according to depth of the water, degree of light
penetration, distance from shores and open water versus bottom.
• Marine communities illustrate the limitations of species that
result from these abiotic factors.
• Phytoplankton. Zooplankton and many fish species occur in the
relatively shallow photic zone
• The aphotic zone is devoided of light
• and harbors relatively little life, except microorganisms, and
relatively sparse populations of luminescent fishes and
invertebrates.
Aquatic Biomes
• An eutrophic lake is typically shallow with a soft and muddy bottom.
Rooted plant growth is abundant along the shore and out into the lake,
and algal blooms are not unusual. Water clarity is not good and the
water often has a tea color. If deep enough to thermally stratify, the
bottom waters are devoid of oxygen

• Oligotrophic lakes are low in nutrients and primary production, rich in

oxygen throughout, and have good water clarity. Dimictic lakes turn
over twice a year, during the spring and the fall. This remixes
dissolved oxygen and nutrients, needed by plants and animals in the
lake
 Concept 4: Climate largely determines the distribution
and structure of terrestrial biomes
• Most terrestrial biomes are named for major physical or
climatic features and for their predominant vegetation
• Temperate grasslands, for instance, are generally found in
middle latitudes where the climate is more moderate than in
the tropics or polar regions, and are dominated by various
grass species
• Each biome is also characterized by microorganisms, fungi,
and animals adapted to that particular environment.
For example, temperate grasslands are more likely than
forests to be populated by large grazing animals.
• Vertical stratification is an important feature of terrestrial biomes,
and the shapes and sizes of plants largely define the layering. For
example:
In many tropical forests, the layers consists of canopy, then
the low – tree stratum, the shrub understory, the ground layer
of herbaceous plants, the forest floor or litter layer and finally
the root layer.
Non-forest biomes have similar, though usually less
pronounced strata while grasslands have an herbaceous layer
of grasses and forbs, a litter layer, and a root layer.
Stratification of vegetation provides many different habitats for
animals, which often occupy well – defined feeding groups,
from the insectivorous and carnivorous, birds and bats that
feed above canopies to the small mammals, numerous worms
and arthropods that forage in the litter and root layers for food.
• Terrestrial biomes usually grade into each other, without sharp
boundaries with an area of intergradations of wide or narrow area
called ecotone.
• The actual species composition of any one kind of biome varies
from one location to another.
• Biomes are dynamic and disturbance rather than stability tends to
be the rule. For example:
hurricanes create openings for new species in tropical and
temperate forests.
In northern coniferous forests, old trees die and fall over, or
snowfall may break branches, producing gaps that allow
deciduous species to grow
• As result, biomes usually exhibit extensive patchiness with
several different communities represented in any particular area.
• In many biomes, the dominant plants depend on periodic
disturbance. For example, natural wildfires are an integral
• Ecotones are areas of steep transition between ecological
communities, ecosystems, and/or ecological regions along
an environmental or other gradient.
• Ecotones occur at multiple spatial scales and range from
natural ecotones between ecosystems and biomes to
human-generated boundaries
• In many biomes today, extensive human activity has radically
altered the natural patterns of periodic physical disturbance.
• Humans have altered much of Earth’s surface, replacing original
biomes with urban and agricultural ones.
• Disturbance can be either Endogenous (gap-phase replacement,
grazing) or Exogenous (fire, flooding, hurricanes).
• A biome / ecosystem can resist in face of disturbance or bounce
back after a certain magnitude of disturbance. In ecology we
specify these events by resilience or resistance
• Resilience – ability of system to bounce back; magnitude of
disturbance that can be absorbed by an ecosystem before its
structure is changed to a different state.
• Resistance – ability to maintain structure or function in face of
disturbance.
END!