There are three basic types of forest ecosystems: coniferous or evergreen forest, deciduous or broadleaf forest, and rain forest.
What are the three basic types of forest ecosystems?
In some areas there are forests that have a mix of evergreen and broadleaf trees.
In some areas there are forests that have a mix of what?
Deciduous, evergreen, and mixed forests are each a little different.
Deciduous, evergreen, and mixed forests are each a little what?
Some forests have varieties of plants and animals that are unique to that type of forest.
What do some forest have?
Living things have changed over time and adapted to their surroundings in each of these forests.
What have changed overtime and adapted to their surroundings in each of these forests?
Some animals, like bears, can live in all three kinds of ecosystems, while others are limited to a particular type of ecosystem.
What is one animal that can live in three ecosystems?
Almost always plants; called autotrophs (“self-feeders”)—make their own energy food; process called photosynthesis; MUST HAVE energy from sun to power ecosystem
What is a producer?
Deciduous trees lose their leaves when the season changes; coniferous trees are evergreen and do not lose their needles all at one time.
What is one defining difference between deciduous forests and evergreen forests?
Some animals spread the seeds of plants. This gives plants a chance to grow.
What is one way that some animals help plants?
Forest floor
What is the bottom layer of the forest called?
The taiga, or the boreal forest. It is a vast, dense, conifer forest that circles the Earth.a moist subarctic forest dominated by conifers (as spruce and fir) that begins where the tundra ends
What is the taiga?
is south of the tundra.
Where is the taiga?
The dominant trees in the taiga are tall spruce trees.
What are trees like in the taiga?
Other trees include firs, pines, larches, birches, and alders.
What are some trees in the taiga?
Conifers are evergreen trees and shrubs that have needle-shaped or scale-like leaves and true cones (such as pines) or a particular kind of fruit (such as yews).
What are conifers?
Spruce, firs, pines, and larches are conifers.
What is an example of a conifers?
Alders and birches are deciduous
What are deciduous?
deciduous means they lose their leaves.
What does deciduous mean?
There are bushes and shrubs, and a few species of flowering plants, in the taiga.
What is there in the taiga?
About 80 species of mammals.
How many species of mammals in the taiga?
300 or more species of birds.
How many species of birds in the taiga?
thousands of species of insects live in the taiga.
How many species of insects in the taiga?
any of a group of mostly evergreen trees and shrubs
What is a conifer?
Conifers usually have needle-shaped or scale-like leaves, and they have woody structures—the cones—that contain seeds.
What are two ways conifers are different from deciduous trees?
Most of the plants in the taiga are evergreens, such as the spruce trees.
What are most plants in the taiga?
The taiga has some open areas and some boggy areas.
Wha areas does the taiga have?
The taiga’s bushes and shrubs, and its lichens, mosses, and flowering plants grow wherever the dense evergreen forest opens up a little or in the north, where fewer or no trees grow.
The taiga’s bushes and shrubs, and its lichens, mosses, and flowering plants grow where?
Taiga temperatures range from winter’s -65°F to summer’s occasional 70°F (-54 to 21° C).
What is the temperature in the taiga?
Occasional temperature extremes make the taiga warmer or colder than the tundra.
What happens occasional to extreme temperatures?
Precipitation—about 40 inches per year—is relatively low, but evaporation is also relatively low.
How much precipitation in a year at the taiga?
There is enough precipitation to sustain the dense forests and other plant life.
How much precipitation is there enough for?
Summer rainfall average 10″-20″ per year.
How much rainfall in the summer?
Winter precipitation, which is mostly snow, averages 20″-40″.
How much rainfall in the winter?
Even so, trees grow very slowly on the taiga.
Does it take a long time or a short time for trees to grow?
Yes. The taiga is one of the biomes discussed in the Ecology event.
Is the taiga a biome?
The taiga is the largest land biome and the largest forest in the world covering 50 million acres or about 17% of the Earth’s land and accounts for 27% of the world’s forests.
What is the largest biome?
The taiga covers most of northern Canada and Russia, and is characterized by many coniferous trees and often very cold weather in the winter.
What covers most of northern Canada and Russia?
The word Taiga comes from the Russian word for forest swamp.
Where does the word taiga come from?
The name boreal forest is often used as a synonym for taiga, however, strictly speaking, the boreal forest only represents the southern part of the taiga; the part where conditions are suitable for trees to grow. In the northern taiga conditions are so cold and dry that trees can not sustain life.
What is the synonym for taiga?
Muskeg is a soil type characteristic of the taiga.
What is Muskeg?
conifers
What type of tree is able to keep its leaves all year and survive cold, snowy winters?
River otters are omnivore consumers. Their diet consists of a variety of foods, including fish, shellfish, crustaceans, snails, beetles, amphibians, and other small mammals. River otters are also food for other consumers: they are hunted by foxes and wolves.
What roles does the river otter play in the taiga ecosystem?
Insects are an important food source for fish, birds, and small mammals. Insects also help the ecosystem as decomposers and plant pollinators.
Why are insects important to the taiga ecosystem?
White or Black Spruce, firs, tamarack, and pines; deciduous: birch, alder, aspen, and larch
Identify two conifers and two deciduous trees you might find in a taiga forest.
