ACTUAL Exam Questions and CORRECT
Answers
Population - CORRECT ANSWER - Interbreeding group of organisms of the same species
in the same area.
Why do we study populations?
1) Predict future growth trends.
2) They are an indicator of ecological conditions.
3) We see how they interact with abiotic/biotic factors
Exponential Growth - CORRECT ANSWER - Unrestricted growth
-In a population there is a potential for unrestricted growth but thee is only a limited number of
resources available.
-Occurs during the early phases of growth (invasion of opportunistic species)
Discrete Exponential Growth - CORRECT ANSWER - -Specific breeding
season/organism may only live to breed then die.
- N=NoRo^t
-Ro= net reproduction rate, number of females produced per female.
-N= population size
-No= initial population size
-t= Time periods
Continuous Exponential Growth (overlapping generations breed repeatedly) - CORRECT
ANSWER - dN/dt=rN
dN= change in pop. size
dt= change in time (t2-t1)
r= intrinzic rate of increase (birth rate - death rate)
, N= pop. size
N=Noe^rt
Logistic Growth - CORRECT ANSWER - - restricted growth
- dN/dt=rN(K-N/K)
-K= carrying capacity of the environment
Population Regulators - CORRECT ANSWER - - Factors that regulate populations below
the carrying capacity
Density Independent Pop. Regulators - CORRECT ANSWER - - not influenced by the
population size
- same percentage of individuals affected
- abiotic- weather, fire, hurricanes
Density Dependent Pop. Regulators - CORRECT ANSWER - - Depend on the population
size
- Effects increase when the population increases
- Ex. disease, competition, crowding stress
Demography - CORRECT ANSWER - Study of vital statistics that affect pop. growth and
size
Survivorship - CORRECT ANSWER - - lx= proportion of original cohort (group of
individuals born at the same time) surviving to age X
Survivorship Curves - CORRECT ANSWER - -plot the log10 of survivorship vs. time
-3 types