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Organisms and Populations Notes

This document discusses population attributes and population interactions. It defines a population as a group of individuals that can interbreed. Populations have attributes like birth rate, death rate, sex ratio, and age distribution. A population can be expanding, stable, or declining based on the ratio of young to old individuals. Population density is affected by factors like natality, mortality, immigration, and emigration. Population growth can be exponential or logistic depending on resource availability. There are different types of population interactions like predation, competition, parasitism, commensalism, mutualism, and amensalism.

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12 views5 pages

Organisms and Populations Notes

This document discusses population attributes and population interactions. It defines a population as a group of individuals that can interbreed. Populations have attributes like birth rate, death rate, sex ratio, and age distribution. A population can be expanding, stable, or declining based on the ratio of young to old individuals. Population density is affected by factors like natality, mortality, immigration, and emigration. Population growth can be exponential or logistic depending on resource availability. There are different types of population interactions like predation, competition, parasitism, commensalism, mutualism, and amensalism.

Uploaded by

raushankumar05072
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Organisms and populations


Population attributes

Population is defined as group of individuals of a species that can interbreed


and produce fertile offspring. A population has certain attributes. A population
may have death rate or birth rate. Increase in population per capita is known
as birth rate whereas decrease in population is known as death rate. Another
attribute of population is known as sex ratio. Age distribution is also an
attribute of population. Age distribution is presented in the form of age
pyramid. The shape of the pyramid reflects the status of the population.

The population can be (a)expanding, (b) stable and(c) declining.

Expanding population is the characteristics of growing population where


number of young individuals are more than the old individuals.

When the young and old individuals are equal, it is known as stable population.
When old individuals are more compare to young individuals, then the
population is said to be declining. The size of the population for any species is
not static. It changes according to food availability, predation pressure and
adverse weather.
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Population density changes because of the four main reasons-

• Natality is defined as number of births in a given period of time.

• Mortality is defined as number of deaths in a given period of time. •


Immigration is defined as when the number of individuals of the same species
have come into the habitat for a period of time.

• Emigration is defined as when the number of individuals of the same species


move to somewhere else for a period of time.

Population attributes that affects population density Population density


represented by N, is given as N is the population density at time t,

B+I represent birth rate and immigration,

D+E represents death rate and emigration.

Poulation size Nt = N + B+ I- (D+E)

N= initial population

Nt =Population after time t

Growth models •

(i) Exponential growth-- Exponential growth is observed when the


nutrients are available in excess quantity. If in a population of size N, the
birth rates (not total number but per capita births) are represented as b
and death rates (again, per capita death rates) as d, then the increase or
decrease in N during a unit time period t (dN/dt) will be- dN/dt = (b – d)
× N Let (b–d) = r,
then dN/dt = rN . In Exponential growth the r in this equation is called
the ‘intrinsic rate of natural increase. The exponential or the geometric
growth pattern of population results in J-shaped curve. The final
equation obtained is given as- Nt = N0 e rt Nt = Population density after
time t N0 = Population density at time zero r = intrinsic rate of natural
increase e = the base of natural logarithms
(ii) • Logistic growth ---When the resources are limited, then the
population growth curve is logistic in nature. When the resources are
limited, competition between the individuals occurs. When growing in
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limited resources, a population initially goes through lag phase,


followed by phases of exponential growth and deceleration and finally
asymptote.

Logistic growth curve--- The curve obtained is sigmoid in shape. This type of
population growth is known as Verhulst-Pearl Logistic Growth, given by the
following equationN = Population density at time t r = Intrinsic rate of natural
increase K = Carrying capacity

B is logistic growth
curve and A is exponential growth curve .
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Population interactions --There are two main interaction-interspecific


interactions and intraspecific interactions. Intraspecific interaction occurs
between the same species whereas interspecific interactions occurs between
the different species.

Types of population interaction •

(a) Predation --is an interspecific interaction where predator kills and


consumes the prey. This is important interaction to maintain the prey
species. For plants, herbivores are predators. Plants have different
adaptations to prevent the attack of the predators. Some have thorns
for defense. Some plants produce toxic glycosides as defensive agent.
Nicotine, caffeine, quinine etc. are the defensive chemicals produced by
the plants which are of commercial importance.
(b) • Competition --can be interspecific as well as intraspecific. Competition
occurs between closely related species for food, shelter, etc. It occurs
when the resources are limited.
Gause’s principle of Competitive Exclusion --states that two closely
related species competing for the same resources cannot co-exist
indefinitely and the competitively inferior one will be eliminated
eventually. This may be true if resources are limiting, but not otherwise.
(c) • Parasitism-- is an interaction where one species is dependent on
the other species for food. In this relationship, one organism is parasite
is benefitted whereas the other organism is harmed. Parasites that feed
on the external surface of the host organism are called ectoparasites.
Many marine fish are infested with ectoparasitic copepods.
Brood parasitism in birds is a fascinating example of parasitism in which
the parasitic bird lays its eggs in the nest of its host and lets the host
incubate them.
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(d)• Commensalism-- is an interaction in which one species benefits the


other species is neither harmed nor benefitted. An orchid growing as an
epiphyte on a mango branch is an example of commensalism.

(e) • Mutualism -is an interaction where both the species interacting will
benefit each other. Lichens and mycorrhiza are most important example
of mutualism. Lichens is mutualistic relationship between algae and
fungi. Mycorrhiza is relation between the fungi and the roots of the
higher plants.
(f) • Amensalism-- is a relationship in which one species is harmed and
other interacting species is neither harmed nor benefitted. Eg.is killing of
bacterial pathogen by antibiotic (chemical) released from fungus
Penicillium .Here fungi is un affected .

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