SPECIES INTERACTIONS

Community Interactions

Competition – occurs when organisms of the same or different species attempt to use an ecological resource in the same place at the same time.

Resources: water, food, light, space.

Community Interactions

Predation – when an organism feeds on another organism (predator prey)

Symbiosis – Any relationship in which two species live closely.

Mutualism Commensalism Parasitism

Mutualism (++)

When both species benefit from the relationship

Example: Many flowers depend on insects to pollinate them. Bugs help flowers reproduce and flowers provide bugs with nectar, pollen, etc.

Commensalism (+0)

One member benefits and the other is neither helped nor harmed.

Example: barnacles attach to a whale’s skin. Barnacles are able to filter feed from water rushing past them but they do nothing, good or bad, for the whale.

Parasitism (+-)

One organism lives on or in another organism and harms it.

Examples: fleas, ticks, tapeworms, zombie snails….

Zombie Snail Video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWB_COSUXMw&safety_mode=true&persist_safety_mode=1