Ecosystem

Ecosystem was first proposed by [Link] (1935) who defined

ecosystem as follows:
“Ecosystem is defined as a self-sustained community of plants and
animals existing in its own environment.”
Odum (1971) defined ecosystem as any unit that includes all the
organisms in a given area interacting with the physical environment, so
that a flow of energy give rise to a clearly defined tropic structure,
biotic diversity and material cycles within the system” Michael Allaby
(1983) defined ecosystem as a community of interdependent organisms
together with the environment
CONCEPT OF ECOSYSTEM:

In an ecosystem, the interaction of life with its environment takes place

at many levels. A single bacterium in the soil interacts with water, air
around it within a small space while a fish in a river interacts with water
and other animals, rivals in a large [Link] the operational
point of view; the biotic and abiotic components of an ecosystem are
so interlinked such that their separation from each other is practically
difficult. So, in an ecosystem both organisms (biotic communities) and
abiotic environment (rainfall, temperature,humidity) each influence the
properties with other for maintenance of life.

COMPONENTS OF AN ECOSYSTEM:
There are two components of an ecosystem; Living components and
non-living components.

Non-Living Components: (Abiotic) Non living components are the

physical and chemical factors that directly or indirectly affect the living
components e.g. air, water, land, rock etc. Non living components are
also called Abiotic components.
Physical factors include sunlight, water, fire, soil, air, temperature etc.
Chemical factors include moisture, salinity of water, soil nutrients,
oxygen dissolved in water
etc.
Living Components: Living components in an ecosystem are either
producers or consumers.
They are also called biotic components. Producers can produce organic
components e.g. plants can produce starch, carbohydrates, cellulose
from a process called photosynthesis. Consumers are the components
that are dependent on producers for their food e.g. human beings and
animals•
Biotic Components are further classified into 3 main groups
•Producers •Consumers •Decomposers
1. Producer (Autotrophs): The green plants have chlorophyll with
the help of which they trap solar energy and change it into
chemical energy of carbohydrates using simple inorganic
compound namely, water and carbon dioxide. This process is
known as photosynthesis. The chemical energy stored by the
producers is utilized partly by the producers for their own growth
and survival and the remaining is stored in the plants for their
future use. They are classified into two categories based on their
source of food.
a)Photoautotrophs: An organism capable of synthesizing its
own food from inorganic substances using light as an energy
source. Green plants and photosynthetic bacteria are
photoautotrophs

6H2O + 6CO2 → C6H12O6 +6O2

2. Consumers (Heterotrophs): The animals lack chlorophyll and are

unable to synthesis their own food therefore they depend on the
producers for their food. •They are known as heterotrophs (i.e.,
heteros= others, trophs= feeder). The Consumers are of 4 types:
(a) Primary Consumer: (Herbivores) i.e., Animal feeding on plants,
e.g., Rabbit, deer, goat etc.
(b) Secondary Consumers: The animal feeding on Herbivores are
called as secondary Consumer or primary carnivores. e.g. Cats, foxes,
snakes.
(c) Tertiary Consumers: These are large carnivores which feed on
secondary consumers. e.g., Wolves
(d) Quaternary Consumers: They are also called omnivores these are
largest carnivores Which feed on tertiary consumers and are not eaten
up by any other animals. e.g., lion and Tiger.
3. Decomposers :Bacteria & fungi belong to this category. They break
down the dead organic matter of producers & consumers for their food
and release to the environment the simple inorganic and organic
substance. These simple substances are reused by the producers
resulting in a cyclic exchange of material between biotic & abiotic
environment.
Eg: Bacteria, Earth worms, Beetles etc

CLASSIFICATION OF ECOSYSTEMS

Due to the abiotic factors, different ecosystems develop in different

ways. These factors and their interaction between each other and with
biotic components have resulted in formation of different types of
ecosystems as explained [Link] may be natural or artificial.
Artificial Ecosystem: These are maintained or created artificially by
man. The man tries to control biotic community as well as physico-
chemical environment. E.g.: Artificial pond, urban area development.
Natural Ecosystem: It consists of Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecosystems
which are maintained naturally.

Different types of ecosystem of biosphere artificially categorized as

follows:
I) Natural Ecosystems: These ecosystems operate by themselves
under natural conditions without any major interference by man. Based
upon the particular kind of habitat, these arefurther divided as:
•Terrestrial as forest, grassland, desert etc.
•Aquatic which may be further distinguished as
•Freshwater which may be lotic (running water as springs, stream,
river) or lentic (standing water as lake, pond, pools, ditch, swamps, etc.)
•Marine Ecosystems: as an ocean or shallow ones like sea or estuary
etc.
II) Artificial Ecosystems: These are maintained by man where, by
addition of energy & planned manipulations natural balance is
disturbed regularly.
For eg : croplands like maize, wheat, rice-fields etc., where man tries
to control the biotic community as well as physico-chemical
environment are artificial ecosystems
Pond Ecosystem: A Pond as a whole serves a good example of
freshwater ecosystem
•Abiotic Components: The chief components are heat, light, pH of
water, CO2, oxygen,
calcium, nitrogen, phosphates, etc.
•Biotic Components: The various organization that constitute the
biotic component are as
follows,
•Producers: These are green plants, and some photosynthetic bacteria.
The producer fix radiant energy and convert it into organic substances
as carbohydrates, protein etc
•Macrophytes: these are large rooted plants, which include partly or
completely submerged hydrophytes, e.g., Hydrilla, Trapha, Typha.
•Phytoplankton: These are minute floating or submerged lower plants
e.g. algae.
•Consumers: They are heterotrophs which depend for their nutrition
on the organic food manufactured by producers. •Primary
Consumers: – Benthos: These are animals associated with living
plants,detrivores and some other microorganisms Zooplanktons:
These are chiefly rotifers, protozoans, they feed on phytoplankton
•Secondary Consumers: They are the Carnivores which feed on
herbivores, these are chiefly insect and fish, most insects & water
beetles, they feed on zooplanktons. •Tertiary Consumers: These are
some large fish as game fish, turtles, which feed on small fish and thus
become tertiary consumers. •Decomposers: They are also known as
[Link] decompose dead organic matter of both
producers and animal to simple form. Thus, they play an important role
in the return of minerals again to the pond ecosystem, they are chiefly
bacteria, & fungi.

Pond ecosystem fig;1

Ocean Ecosystem
are more stable than pond ecosystem, they occupy 70 % of the earth
surface.
•Abiotic Components: Dissolved oxygen, light, temperature,
minerals. •Biotic Components:
•Producers: These are autotrophs and are also known Primary
producers. They are mainly, some microscopic algae (phyto-
planlanktons) besides them there are mainly, seaweeds, as brown and
red algae also contribute to primary production. •Consumers: They are
all heterotrophic macro consumers •Primary Consumer: The
herbivores, that feed on producers are shrimps, Molluscs, fish, etc.
•Secondary Consumers: These are carnivores’ fish as Herring, Shad,
Mackerel, feeding on herbivores. •Tertiary Consumers: These
includes, other carnivores’ fishes like, COD, Halibut, Sea Turtle,
Sharks etc.
•Decomposers: The microbes active in the decay of dead organic
matter of producers, and animals are chiefly, bacteria and some fungi.

Ocean ecosystem

River Ecosystem
•As Compared with lentic freshwater (Ponds & lakes), lotic waters such
as streams, and river have been less studied. However, the various
components of an riverine and stream ecosystem can be arranged as
follows. •Producers: The chief producers that remain permanently
attached to a firm substratum are green algae as Cladophora, and
aquatic mosses. •Consumers: The consumers show certain features as
permanent attachment to firm substrata, presence of hooks & suckers,
sticky undersurface, streamline bodies, flattened bodies. Thus a variety
of animal are found, which are fresh spongy and caddis-fly larvae,
snails, flat worms etc. •Decomposers:Various bacteria and fungi like
actinomycetes are present which acts as decompose
FOOD CHAIN:
In food chain each organism eats the smaller organisms and is eaten by
the larger one. All those organisms which are interlinked with each
other through food to gather constitute the ecosystem.•The different
levels in a food chain are called tropic levels, Each food chain has three
maintropic levels:- Producer level, Consumer level, and decomposer
level. If any of the intermediate stage of the food chain is removed, the
succeeding links of the food chain will be affected
Types of Food Chains:
a) Grazing Food Chain: This type of food chain starts from living
green plants goes to
grazing herbivores and onto carnivores. Ecosystem with such type of
food chain directly depends upon the solar energy for their food
requirements. Most of the ecosystem in nature follows this type of food
chain.

Phytoplankton ‘s→ Zooplanktons→ Fish→ Man

b) Detritus food Chain: This type of food chain goes from dead
organic matter onto microorganisms and then to the organisms feeding
on detritus and their predators. Such ecosystems are less dependent on
direct solar energy.

Dead organic matter→ Bacteria → Insects.

c) Parasitic Food Chain: This type of food chain starts from big hosts
and ends with parasitic organisms.

Tree→Birds→Parasite→Hyperparasite
FOOD WEB:
The interconnected, interlocking pattern of food chain is known as food
web. •Under natural condition of the linear arrangement of food chain
hardly occurs and they remain interconnected with each other through
different types of organisms at different levels Such a interconnected
and interlocking pattern of food chain is known as food web..
ECOLOGICAL PYRAMIDS
The different species in a food chain are called tropic levels. Each food
chain has 3 main trophic level, producer, consumer, and decomposers.
•Thus Graphical representation of these trophic levels is called as
Ecological Pyramids. It was devised by an ecologist “Charles Elton”
therefore this pyramid are also called Ecological pyramid or Eltonian
pyramids.
Types of Ecological Pyramids:
Ecological pyramids are of three types: I
I) Pyramid of Number (Showing Population)
II)Pyramid of biomass (Showing total mass of organism)

III)Pyramid of Energy (Showing Energy flow)

I) Pyramid of Number:
•They show the relationship between producers, herbivores, and
carnivores at successive tropic levels in terms of their number.
•In case of pond ecosystem the producers are mainly phytoplankton and
are always maximum in number this number then shows a decrease
towards apex as primary consumers are zooplanktons are lesser in
number than phytoplankton, the secondary consumers are large fish
are even lesser in number than the phytoplankton. Thus the shape of
pyramid is upright. But in case of forest ecosystem the pyramids is
always inverted because the producers are mainly large trees, are lesser
in numbers, the herbivores fruit eating birds are more in number than
the producers, then there is gradual decrease in number of secondary
consumers thus making pyramid upright again. Thus the pyramid of
number does not give a true picture of the food chain and are not very
functional.

Pyramid of number in pond ecosystem

ppp

pyramid of parasite

Pyramid of Biomass:
•The pyramid of biomass represents the relationship between different
tropic levels in terms of biomass. •There is generally gradual decrease
in biomass of organisms at successive levels from the producers to the
top carnivores. Thus pyramid of biomass is upright for grassland
ecosystem.•However in case of a pond as the producers are algae, are
least in number and this value gradually shows an increase towards the
apex of pyramid thus making the pyramid inverted in shape.

.
Pyramid of Energy: The amount of energy present at each trophic level
is considered for this type of pyramid. Pyramid of energy gives the best
representation of the trophic relationships and it is always upright at
every successive trophic level, there is a huge loss of energy (about
90%) in the form of heat, respiration etc. Thus, at each next higher
level only 10% of the energy passes on. Hence, there is a sharp decline
in energy level of each successive trophic level as we move from
producers to top carnivores. Therefore, the pyramid of energy is
always upright as shown in Fig.
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
Sustainable development is defined as “meeting the needs of the
present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet
their own needs.”
Sustainable development implies using the natural resources in such a
manner which doesn’t eliminate or diminish their usefulness for future
generations e.g.: coal, crude oil; forests. Hence, the concept of
Sustainable Development could be termed development without
destruction. Measures for Sustainable Development: Following are the
measures for the sustainable development:
1. Population Control: Population growth should be limited to the
desirable level. Slow human population growth, reduce the stress on
global life.
2. Biodiversity (variety of life on earth and how the living things
interact with each other) must be conserved.
3. Recycling of wastes: Recycle at least 60% of the materials which are
discarded now as trash.
4. Reduced Consumption: Lifestyle should be shifted to lesser
consumption of resources.
5. Efficient usage of Resources: Resources should be renewed or
reused. For eg: solar energy should be encouraged.
6. Water Resource Management: Some of the consequences of poor
water resource management such as

(A) River flooding; (B) Silting of reservoirs, ponds, lakes;

(C) over exploitation of groundwater; (D) Water logging by over
irrigation
(E) Improper drainage (F) Pollution of water bodies
are to be taken up for implementation. So, Sustainable development
insists optimum management of water resources locally and globally.
7. Integrated Land use planning: Using lands for agriculture, forestry,
fodder cultivation, industrial growth, traffic etc should be planned.
8. Creating Awareness: Creation of environmental awareness and
spreading environmental education among the people is must for
fruitful results..