Exam 15: Conserving Biodiversity: Community and Ecosystem Ecology

Each breed of dog is known to be susceptible to certain illnesses, such as heart problems, eye disorders, or thyroid problems. Often, dog breeders will go to great lengths to breed a dog that's unrelated to a dog they want to breed. This is because

The average lifespan of a species on Earth is estimated to be around ________ years.

To address the problem of preserving biodiversity, biologist Norman Myers and colleagues have identified various "hotspots" around the world. What exactly is a hotspot?

In the heart of Costa Rica there's a private reserve called Rara Avis. Here, one can hike high into the mountains of a tropical cloud forest to take guided nature hikes and learn about this unique ecosystem. This is an example of how habitats can be preserved through

The loss of heath hens in North America was an example of

At the current rate of habitat destruction, tropical rainforests will be reduced to ________ of their original size within 35 years, and ________ of species living there will go extinct.

Salmonella enteritidis causes a food-borne illness that kills 400 to 600 Americans each year. It is found mainly in poultry products. Rather than give large doses of antibiotics to poultry, some poultry producers infect the intestinal tract of hens with a harmless bacteria, resulting in a dramatic decrease of S. enteritidis found in the chickens. In this case, the producers have used the principle of

Which of the following can be considered a predator?

In 1846, the failure of "Lumper" potato crops in Ireland was due to

Extracts of the rosy periwinkle, Catharus roseus, have provided medicine with vincristine and vinblastine, drugs now available for treating cancer. The ability to find this species of plant and discover these drugs is a strong argument for

Is a species that has few individuals at greater risk of extinction than a species with a large population size? Why or why not?

In order to be considered extinct, a species can't be found

Over the past 580 million years, biodiversity has

The sudden loss of a ________ would necessarily cause the loss of most or all of a food web.

$\rightarrow$ -According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), which of the following sequences shows groups with the highest percentage of species in danger of extinction, from most endangered (on the left)to least endangered (on the right)?

Global climate change is likely to increase the rate of extinction worldwide. The pollutant most implicated in this problem is

How many species "normally" go extinct each year, as estimated by scientists?

Most of the energy contained in one trophic level is "lost" when it gets to the next trophic level. The lost energy takes the form of

The North Atlantic Right Whale, Eubalaena glacialis, was called the "right whale" because they were the best whale for early whalers to kill. They have long baleen and lots of blubber and oil. When killed, they could be towed back to land for processing because they float. They once numbered in the millions, but the entire population of the species is now less than 400. The history of the right whale is an example of

Which of the following would be most threatened by habitat fragmentation?