CHANGES IN ECOSYSTEMS

CHANGES, CHANGES, CHANGES

• Change is always occurring in ecosystems.

• All organisms, including humans, cause change.

• Two types of changes:

• Natural- happens naturally• Human- caused by humans

NATURAL CHANGES: DETRIMENTAL

• Detrimental means harmful, so a detrimental change to an ecosystem is a change that does harm.

• Drought- a long period of time with little or no precipitation.

OTHER NATURAL, DETRIMENTAL CHANGES

• Natural disasters sometimes bring detrimental changes.

• Examples:

• forest fires• tornadoes• flooding• hurricanes• earthquakes

OTHER NATURAL, DETRIMENTAL CHANGES

• Overpopulation- when an ecosystem has too many of at least one kind of living thing.

• For example, what problems may arise if there was an overpopulation of coyotes in forest ecosystem ?

• More rabbits would be eaten, so the rabbit population would decrease.

• If there are no rabbits left, what would the coyotes do?

DETRIMENTAL CHANGES CAUSED BY HUMANS

• Pollution- happens when harmful substances are added to Earth’s water, air, or land.

• Acid rain- acids mix with water in the air and fall to the Earth.

DETRIMENTAL CHANGES CAUSED BY HUMANS

• Construction causes detrimental changes to ecosystems.

• Deforestation- cutting down trees in a forest area

NATURAL CHANGES: BENEFICIAL

• Beneficial means helpful, so a beneficial change to an ecosystem is something that is helpful.

• Overpopulation can be beneficial.

• An overpopulation of rabbits is detrimental for the rabbits because there are not enough resources for all of them.

• BUT… it’s beneficial for coyotes. They will have MORE to eat!!!

BENEFICIAL CHANGES CAUSED BY HUMANS

• Laws can be made that decrease or stop pollution, littering, acid rain, and deforestation.

• Planting trees or other plants is beneficial to every kind of ecosystem.

• The Three R’s: Recycle, Reduce, Reuse

BENEFICIAL CHANGES CAUSED BY HUMANS

• New vehicles are being made that use less oil. This means less of damaging ecosystems for oil.

• New technology uses less electricity. This means less mining for coal.

How could this beaver building a dam be a beneficial change? How could it also be a detrimental change?

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