1. Within one of the zones, a distribution pattern comes to your attention, in w
ID: 54352 • Letter: 1
Question
1. Within one of the zones, a distribution pattern comes to your attention, in which a forest is found adjacent to a grassland:
A) If you assume two soil parent materials are involved, what kinds of soil differences are possible that might explain the distribution of these two vegetation types? Give some examples.
B) If these two vegetation types were actually on the same soil parent material, in what ways might the soils differ in that circumstance? Give some examples.
2. The two species above undoubtedly demonstrate different allocation patterns. The principle of allocation patterns is one of the few ecological principles that seem to work consistently. Discuss this principle and contrast your predictions of allocation patterns between species A and species B. Provide examples (from the previous questions) that illustrate how allocation differences in structure or physiology could provide the difference between the data you observed. If you have some general examples you’d like to use that don’t fit questions 1-4, use them as a speculation for your species and justify your position.
Explanation / Answer
* Forest floors - have organic material on the soil surface. It contain fresh organic material from decaying plant vegetaion and dead organisms. They are easily degrded by micorbes. The fluctuation in temperatures in forests are typically low, and thus accumulation of organic matter is fast. Minerals increse with deapth of the soils. The vegetation of the soils, the organic material, allow water seeping into the soils. The moisture level in the soils is considerably high. The forests have sandy parent materials of spodosols, and finer material of alfisols and ultisols.
* Grasslands rich in nutrients to the soil deapth due to decomposition of extensively branched root systems of grass plants.. The level of moisture also is less or not enough to support growth of large trees. The climatic variations are pretty high. The soils of grasslands are generally porous, with rapid drainage of water. It has only a thin layer of humus. The deep rooted grasses hold the soil together and there is less erosion of soils.
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