food webs Essay

Food Webs Paper
Annmarie Stancliff
Mth/221
May 25, 2015
Richard Mestetsky
Food Webs Paper

Skip to Navigation
Skip to Content
In a single ecosystem, all the food chains consisted in a food web. Those that are living in an ecosystem are part of more than one food chain. As the process moves on through the ecosystem, each food chain is one possible path that energy and nutrients may take (Mader, 1996). Indeed all of the interconnected and overlapping food chains contain many organisms that take place within various niches because their resources are available for their habitat (Mader, 1996). Various types of organisms within the food web are grouped into categories called trophic levels. In this food web case study, we will use the food web as a directed graph to model the relationship between predators and prey in an ecological community and the use of graph to visually explain the important parameters that consider a competition for ecological surroundings for organisms.
In a food web within an ecological community, the food graph displays an apex for each organism on a trophic level and a direct border from the apex visually explaining individual A to the apex illustrating individual B, and however, the path continues if A preys on B (Roberts, 1976). Within this particular graph, the toad, milk snake, salamander, raccoon, grasshopper, fox, and the robin were chosen for a group of seven species, and the results show competition among one another. Again, if there is a common prey to catch, the species will compete for the catch; two species will compete for the catch. The graph displays the competition of the raccoon and fox since the robin is a common prey. The vertex of the milk snake and raccoon shows that both species compete for their common prey, the grasshopper. The vertex of salamander and the robin do not compete with one another since they do not share the same prey. The result of a simple food web clearly displays a competition relation. In other words, different species will compete with one another to catch a common prey to eat than those who do not share a common prey will not compete against each other.
Various species of all sorts inhabit niches; it is the practical relationship of an organism to its substantial and biotic domain. The resources that are referred to in terms of factors include the weather such as the temperature and moisture, and amount of acidity, abundancy of nutrients, and so on. However, these factors are subject to change such as the temperature in a certain spot and how it affects PH lying within certain limits (Roberts, 1976). We can consider that these subjects to change for a species defines a region on a graph in n-dimensional Euclidean space whereas n is the number of factors, the following region is called the ecological niche of the species in question according to Roberts in Discrete (1Roberts, Descrete Mathematics, 1976) Mathematical Models with Applications to Social. In simple terms, two different species will not have the same ecological niches; however, they will compete if their ecological niches have open paths through their intersection. Consequently, based on the ecology principle, such as the principle of competitive exclusion, two different species whose niches are too similar, or overlap too much cannot happen in the same place or at the same time (Mader, 1996). Additionally, we should consider that niches are multifaceted because they include a wide variety of aspects of the environment. Defining a niche may be a bit complex, so we break it down in three sets of parameters: 1. Range of physical factors for survival and reproduction, temperature, humidity, phi soil, and sunlight 2. Biological factors: predators, prey, parasites, and competitors 3. Behavior: seasonality, diurnal patterns, movement, and social organization, therefore, the list of sets provided are the study of parameters to describe ecological competition

Show More

Essay about Plant and Food Web

Essay on The Everglades: A Food Web Diagram

Food Web Diagram Paper share

Food Web Chaparral rewrite 2011 Essay

Ticking Thyme Bomb: A Bibliography On Food Bomb Bibliography

Nutrition and Dec. Essay

Iceland and Reykjavik Essay

Meatless Eating: Annotated Bibliography

greek egypt Essay

Essay Genetically Modified Organism and Genetically Engineering Crops