Chapter 13 - Open Ocean

Notes for Chapter 11 (In Part): Energy in Ecosystems
and Chapter 13: Communities and Ecology

Click link to return to Lecture Schedule
or Lecture Notes by Chapter
Back to Chapter 10
Forward to Chapter 14

Chapter 11 (pp. 272-276 only)

IV. Biomass, Energy, and Ecosystem Structure
terms: biomass, wet vs. dry weight, dry organic matter,
standing stock

    a) The Distribution of Biomass among Plants, Herbivores,
        and Carnivores
    terms: pyramid of biomass, pyramid of energy,
     pyramid of numbers

b) Energy Flow - A Key to Inverted Pyramids

RQ 11.1 (Fig. 11.9): Explain why the Black Sea has an
inverted pyramid of biomass, whereas the tropical
Pacific epiplankton does not.

Chapter 13 (all)

Case History: High Tech in Deep Space

Description of Research Vessel - Pt. Lobos at MBARI Website

I. Life at the Open Sea Surface
terms: compensation depth, critical depth, spring bloom

a) The Standard Cold-temperate Ocean

RQ 13.1: Describe annual patterns of productivity in the North
Atlantic, bringing the terms compensation depth and critical
depth into the description.

b) The Seasonal Cycles in Other Oceans

RQ 13.2: Describe annual patterns of productivity in the Sargasso
Sea, bringing the terms compensation depth and critical
depth into the description.

    c) The Annual Productivities of Oceanic Communities
        terms: net primary productivity (NPP), eutrophic,
            oligotrophic

RQ 13.3: Contrast the following habitats in terms of the "apple
        index" used in Fig. 13.4 (equivalent amount of carbon
        in apples per square meter per year): tropical rain forest,
        cropland, desert, rocky intertidal, open ocean, kelp bed,
        coral reef.

II. Communities in the Deep Sea

a) Life in Deep Open Water

b) The Bottom of the Sea

1) The abyssal seafloor is sustained by the arrival of
food from the surface

RQ 13.4: What sorts of organisms are found on a typical
ocean bottom and what do they feed on? What limits their
abundance?

        2) Hydrothermal vents support communities unlike any
            other on Earth
        terms: hydrothermal vents, black smokers, seeps, trophosome
            more black smoker links: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4

RQ 13.5: Explain why life is so abundant around hydrothermal vents.

RQ 13.6: How do the giant pogonophoran tubeworms around
hydrothermal vents derive their energy?

Featured organisms: hot-vent pogonophoran tubeworms
More Links: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6

Click link to return to Lecture Schedule
or Lecture Notes by Chapter
Back to Chapter 10
Forward to Chapter 14