For this task our team was supposed to find an area and create a policy for that area that would change the enviroment in either a good or bad way. For the area we chose a lake above the College of Marin. For our policy we chose to create solar panels on the site to power the actual college.
Evidence of Work.
|
|
Concepts
Policy: A course of action adopted or proposed by a individual, government, or business. Our policy is to place solar panels and a picnic area near the pond in the Indian Valley Preserve.
Climate: Weather conditions in an area in general or over a long period of time. The climate in the Indian Valley preserve is warm dry summers, cool wet winters.
Soil/ ground condition: The soil that is on or under the surface of the earth. In our project the soil is muddy, with a high clay content.
Abiotic Factors: Physical or nonliving factor that shapes an ecosystem (non-living factors). The abiotic factors in our site are water, elevation, and sunlight.
Main Species: A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in an environment. The main species in our project is deer, but our apex is a coyote.
Carrying Capacity: A number of organisms that a region can support without environmental degradation. An area reached a limit when there is no longer any resources.Our Carrying capacity is higher than average.
Biodiversity: The diversity of life in a given area. Our area's biodiversity is average, because it has nothing special to this area.
Matter cycling: Where matter is constantly cycled between living and nonliving parts of the environment. Matter cycling helps us predict the future, in 1000 years. We don't have any water cycle in our area without our policy.
- Nutrient Cycle: The movement and exchange of organic and inorganic matter back into the production of living matter.
- Carbon cycle: The biogeochemical cycle by which carbon is exchanged among the biosphere, pedosphere, geosphere, hydrosphere , and atmosphere of earth.
- Nitrogen cycle: A Biogeochemical cycle by which nitrogen is converted into various chemical forms as it circulates among the atmosphere, terrestrial, and marine ecosystem.
- Water cycle: The journey water take as it circulates from the land to the sky and back again.
Flow of energy: Energy flows through ecosystems in one direction, typically from the Sun, through photosynthetic organisms including green plants and algae, to herbivores
to carnivores and decomposers.
Species behavior: The way in which an animal acts in response to a particular situation. Throughout our presentation species will always be afraid of humans.
Biome: Group of ecosystems that have the same climate and similar dominant communities. Our Ecosystem is part of chaparral biome.
Biology: Science that seeks to understand the living world.
Biotic: Biological influence on organisms within an ecosystem. (Otherwise living factors)
Population:A group of homogenous individuals that live in the same habitat. Our populations includes frogs, deer, coyote, oak trees, and more.
Ecology: The study of the interactions between living things and their environment
Ecosystem: How Communities interact with their environment. ( abiotic-nonliving, biotic-living or once living)
Food web: Webs that show the more complex relationship in the flow of energy through an ecosystem. Seen above.
Biosphere: Where all life exists on earth. ( 11km below earth's surface to 8km above the surface)
Individual: A single living organisms
Community: Populations of different species interacting with each other.
Decomposer: Organisms that Earth's atmosphere.
Greenhouse effect: When heat is retained near earth by layer of gases in the earth's atmosphere.
Niche: The way of life of a species or its role in an ecological community.
Symbiosis: Means to live together. Happens when two species have a close relationship with each other.
Parasitism/Predation/Herbivory: A interaction that harms one organism but benefits the other.
Competition: An interaction that harms both species.
Mutalism: A type of interaction where both species benefit each other.
Commensalism: An interaction that benefits one species and does not affect the other species at all.
Autotroph: Uses energy from the environment to create food.
Heterotroph: They rely on other organisms for energy/food supply. There are herbivore, carnivore, omnivore, detritivore, and decompress in this.
Producer: Autotrophs that are at the bottom of the food chain. Made up of all plants.
Detritivores: They feed on plant and remains of other dead matter for energy.
Consumer: They consume food or energy from others. The first type is herbivores in the environment. The second level eat first level consumers. Top level consumers eat 2nd level consumers.
Trophic Level: The different steps in a food chain or web energy flows from the bottom to the top level.
Resources: A supply of many things that help people live and thrive.
Ecological Succession: Ecosystems are constantly changing in response to natural and human disturbances. As an ecosystem changes, older inhabitants gradually die off and new organisms move in, causing changes in the community.
Primary Succession: Succession that takes place on surfaces where no soil exists.
Pioneer Species: First species to appear in succession.
Secondary Succession: When disturbance of some kind changes an existing community without removing soil. ( example: New plants growing back after forest fire)
Non-Rewable sources: Resources that can't be reused, and can only be used once.
Renewable Resources Resources that can be reused or regrown.
Solar Panels: A panel designed to absorb the sun's rays as a source of energy for generating electricity or heating. These were our policy plan.
Policy: A course of action adopted or proposed by a individual, government, or business. Our policy is to place solar panels and a picnic area near the pond in the Indian Valley Preserve.
Climate: Weather conditions in an area in general or over a long period of time. The climate in the Indian Valley preserve is warm dry summers, cool wet winters.
Soil/ ground condition: The soil that is on or under the surface of the earth. In our project the soil is muddy, with a high clay content.
Abiotic Factors: Physical or nonliving factor that shapes an ecosystem (non-living factors). The abiotic factors in our site are water, elevation, and sunlight.
Main Species: A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in an environment. The main species in our project is deer, but our apex is a coyote.
Carrying Capacity: A number of organisms that a region can support without environmental degradation. An area reached a limit when there is no longer any resources.Our Carrying capacity is higher than average.
Biodiversity: The diversity of life in a given area. Our area's biodiversity is average, because it has nothing special to this area.
Matter cycling: Where matter is constantly cycled between living and nonliving parts of the environment. Matter cycling helps us predict the future, in 1000 years. We don't have any water cycle in our area without our policy.
- Nutrient Cycle: The movement and exchange of organic and inorganic matter back into the production of living matter.
- Carbon cycle: The biogeochemical cycle by which carbon is exchanged among the biosphere, pedosphere, geosphere, hydrosphere , and atmosphere of earth.
- Nitrogen cycle: A Biogeochemical cycle by which nitrogen is converted into various chemical forms as it circulates among the atmosphere, terrestrial, and marine ecosystem.
- Water cycle: The journey water take as it circulates from the land to the sky and back again.
Flow of energy: Energy flows through ecosystems in one direction, typically from the Sun, through photosynthetic organisms including green plants and algae, to herbivores
to carnivores and decomposers.
Species behavior: The way in which an animal acts in response to a particular situation. Throughout our presentation species will always be afraid of humans.
Biome: Group of ecosystems that have the same climate and similar dominant communities. Our Ecosystem is part of chaparral biome.
Biology: Science that seeks to understand the living world.
Biotic: Biological influence on organisms within an ecosystem. (Otherwise living factors)
Population:A group of homogenous individuals that live in the same habitat. Our populations includes frogs, deer, coyote, oak trees, and more.
Ecology: The study of the interactions between living things and their environment
Ecosystem: How Communities interact with their environment. ( abiotic-nonliving, biotic-living or once living)
Food web: Webs that show the more complex relationship in the flow of energy through an ecosystem. Seen above.
Biosphere: Where all life exists on earth. ( 11km below earth's surface to 8km above the surface)
Individual: A single living organisms
Community: Populations of different species interacting with each other.
Decomposer: Organisms that Earth's atmosphere.
Greenhouse effect: When heat is retained near earth by layer of gases in the earth's atmosphere.
Niche: The way of life of a species or its role in an ecological community.
Symbiosis: Means to live together. Happens when two species have a close relationship with each other.
Parasitism/Predation/Herbivory: A interaction that harms one organism but benefits the other.
Competition: An interaction that harms both species.
Mutalism: A type of interaction where both species benefit each other.
Commensalism: An interaction that benefits one species and does not affect the other species at all.
Autotroph: Uses energy from the environment to create food.
Heterotroph: They rely on other organisms for energy/food supply. There are herbivore, carnivore, omnivore, detritivore, and decompress in this.
Producer: Autotrophs that are at the bottom of the food chain. Made up of all plants.
Detritivores: They feed on plant and remains of other dead matter for energy.
Consumer: They consume food or energy from others. The first type is herbivores in the environment. The second level eat first level consumers. Top level consumers eat 2nd level consumers.
Trophic Level: The different steps in a food chain or web energy flows from the bottom to the top level.
Resources: A supply of many things that help people live and thrive.
Ecological Succession: Ecosystems are constantly changing in response to natural and human disturbances. As an ecosystem changes, older inhabitants gradually die off and new organisms move in, causing changes in the community.
Primary Succession: Succession that takes place on surfaces where no soil exists.
Pioneer Species: First species to appear in succession.
Secondary Succession: When disturbance of some kind changes an existing community without removing soil. ( example: New plants growing back after forest fire)
Non-Rewable sources: Resources that can't be reused, and can only be used once.
Renewable Resources Resources that can be reused or regrown.
Solar Panels: A panel designed to absorb the sun's rays as a source of energy for generating electricity or heating. These were our policy plan.
Reflection: I feel that this project was not very interesting. Most of the work was just guesswork on how solar panels were going to change the enviroment. The only interesting part was actually building the model. As for me I feel I could have done more work because most of the work was done from my teammates.