Ecosystem relationships | Baamboozle - Baamboozle

Come up to the whiteboard, I will write a term above your head. Your team can give you hints but cannot say the word itself. You have one minute to guess the term correctly.

competitive relationship

Debate time! Each team picks a representative. Your question is 'should parasites be considered important parts of ecosystems, or should we try to eliminate them whenever possible?'. You have 30 seconds to argue your case.

Most convincing/ scientifically thought out wins.

Ocean acidification is leading to a mass decrease in coral populations. Corals provide food and shelter for fish and other marine life. If corals were to go extinct, how would this impact the fish and ecosystem as a whole?

Without food and shelter, fish populations would likely decrease significantly, without fish, larger predators have no food source. The ecosystem collapses.

Explain what a mutualistic relationship is as though you're talking to a first grader.

Mentions: inter-species, long term, both benefit

Spelling bee! You must spell a word of my choosing. Write your answer on the whiteboard.

Symbiosis

Time for Charades! Come to the front and act out the type of symbiotic relationship I give you. Your team has one minute to guess, you cannot speak.

Parasitism

Epiphytes are plants which grow high in the branches of other trees. They obtain sufficient sunlight to photosynthesise, collect water from moist air, and use decaying leaf litter as nutrients. The tree is not harmed. What rel is this? Why?

This is an example of commensalism, as one organism benefits while the other is not harmed.

Mistletoe likes to grow on Eucalyptus trees. Mistletoe can make their own food but their stems send suckers into eucalyptus to obtain water and minerals. If too much is removed, the tree dies. What is this relationship? Why?

Parasitic as one is harmed while the other benefits.

Give an example of a parasitic relationship.

A long term interspecies relationship where one benefits and the other is harmed as a result.

What is a commensal ecological relationship?

A long term interspecies relationship where one organism benefits and the other is not harmed.

Give an example of a predator-prey relationship.

Opportunistic short term relationship where one eats the other for survival.

How can a large plant that produces lots of shade inhibit other plants from growing?

The large plant competes with the smaller plant for abiotic resources such as sunlight, water and nutrients. Other plants cannot access sunlight in its shade.

State one similarity and one difference between a predator-prey relationship and a parasitic relationship.

similarities: both involve the harm of one species for the benefit of another, both are interspecies. differences: one is symbiotic, one is long term, balanced

Predict what might happen if the Lynx population were to entirely disappear from the ecosystem.

The hare population would increase due to a lack of predators.

Why does the Lynx population line seem to imitate the Hare population line?

Due to the predator-prey relationship between the species. Lynx increase alongside Hare due to an abundance of prey, overabundance of predators decreases prey

Using the graph above, predict when the Hare population is likely to peak next.

Around 1935 somewhere