Introduction

Ecology is a branch of science which aims to understand the process of interaction

between the living organisms and the chemical and physical components pf their environment,,
and the how those processes lead to geographical distribution pattern and abundance of
different organisms. (Schmitz, 2007)
Assembly of a natural economy is the result of the process leading to a pattern, and in
ecology, it is formally called, ecosystem (Schmitz, 2007). Ecosystem can be defined as an
integrated system which is composed of biotic and abiotic components interacting with each
other (Jorgensen, 2009). Environment is the summation of all the factors that affects an
organism. Environment is consists of biotic (all living organisms) and abiotic (temperature,
pressure, and other physical description of the environment) factors, which can be classified
whether environmental resources or condition. Environmental resources are those factors that
can be consumed by the organisms, and can either be renewable or non-renewable,, while
environmental conditions are the factors that are not consumed by an organism, like physical
factors that describes the environment (temperature, humidity, etc) and other living organisms
that are not being consumed by an organism. Every organism responds differently with the
environmental conditions (Gilpin, A. 1996).
Organisms and their physical environment are linked together by the energy flow and
material cycling in the ecosystem. These processes unify the ecosystem to function as a unit.
Energy flow starts from light energy from the sun captured via photosynthesis, which is then
converted to chemical energy of organic compound. Then energy transfers from trophic level to
trophic level through food chains. On the other hand, material cycling is the cycle of elements
such as carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus and water in the ecosystem,, and the supply of such
elements limits biological activity (Regents of the University of Michigan, 2016)
Since organisms are continuously affected by their environment, an important factor to
consider in studying an ecosystem is the evolution of the living organisms to respond to their
environment.
Students of NASC 5 CD-1R will visit different ecosystems to directly observe the
relationship between the components of the ecosystem by observing different organisms in
their natural habitat.
At the end of this exercise, the student should be able to enumerate the different components
of the ecosystem, describe the interaction of the different components of the ecosystem, and
understand the functioning of the ecosystem
Discussion
For the autotrophs in the edible landscaping and forest ecosystem, their growing habit,
number and distribution were first determined (shrub, trees, vines, etc). Then the physical
factors that was observed to affect the plants are light intensity, temperature of air and the
surroundings, relative humidity, wind velocity, soil (type of soil, nutrients in the soil, soil ph and
temperature), precipitation.
Light energy is needed by plants for photosynthesis. However, in the forest ecosystem,
light intensity decreases from the canopy to the forest floor (since the leaves of the tress cover
almost the entire forest), thus limits the growth of plants in the forest floor, this is why plants in
the forest floor ae mainly small plants. However, plants also developed structure to survive
with the lack of light intensity. Plants on the forest floor was observed to have broad leaves in
order for them to capture all the possible light that they can capture when it reaches the forest
floor,, while the leaves of the tall trees are narrower since they receive enough sunlight in the
canopy. In addition, vines found in the forest have adapted by rising up to a height enough for
them to receive sunlight.
Next is the relative humidity. Relative humidity affects the temperature in the
ecosystem. In the edible landscaping, since the ecosystem is exposed to sunlight, the air is dry,
except during precipitation, thus plants are dry, since the water droplets on the leaves surface
evaporates quickly. The same goes when a person visits the ecosystem, his or her sweat will
evaporate quickly, making the person feel fresh while the surrounding is still warm. On the
other hand, the forest ecosystems canopy covers almost, if not all, the whole forest floor
making the air inside the forest ecosystem humidwhen precipitation occurs, the excess water
that plants cannot absorb should evaporate to the atmosphere, however, since the forest is
covered, the water vapors are trapped inside the forest making the air saturated with water
vapor. This high moisture content promotes the growth of fungi (like mushrooms) and other
plant decomposers making dead plants degradation faster, and in return, provides nutrients
for the soil faster that living plants need to survive. In connection to the growth of
decomposers, it was observed that no microconsumers or decomposers were found in the
edible landscaping due to intervention of human, since edible landscaping is man made
therefore, when there are plant litters, humans clean those and dispose, maybe in a pit or by
burning, thus no plant decomposers were found.
The next factor to be considered is the amount of precipitation. Since edible landscaping
is a man-made ecosystem, there is still water supply for the plants to grow even if there is no
precipitation (humans water the plants), thus there are no dry leaves observe in the
ecosystem,,while water supply in the forest depends mainly on precipitation. moreover, in the
forest ecosystem, the soil is somehow steep, therefore, if there is too much precipitation, there
is a probability for soil erosion which lessens the nutrients in the soil or carry plants with them.
That is one of the reason why plants in the forest are mainly trees, for them not to be carried
away during soil erosion, but instead have sturdy roots that can hold the soil firmly. In
connection with soil erosion, wind velocity, if too high, may also cause soil erosion.
As stated earlier, plants absorb nutrients from the soil, therefore soil nutrients affect the
growth of plants. In edible landscaping, nutrient can be provided by humans in the form of
fertilizers, therefore plants in the edible landscaping have grown well. However, in the forest,
the nutrients in the soil comes from the degraded Dead organic matters which makes the role
of decomposers important.
The last factor that affects the growth of plants are the humans. Humans manages the
growth of plants in the edible landscaping, therefore most of the plants are in equal height,
thus there is a little, if none, competition for sunlight,, and the distribution are mainly even,
resulting to little, if none, competition of plants for soil nutrients. This is very different from the
forest in which plants grow on their own anywhere in the forest (explains the random
distribution of plants in the forest) without the intervention of human. therefore plants have
different heights which greatly affects the competition for sunlight as stated earlier, and since
plants grow any where, spaces in the forest are not equally distributed, thus promoting
competition for soil nutrients between the plants.
The last part of the first part of the exercise is the observation of other photosynthetic
organisms in the ecosystem. Moss are found in the surface of rocks in both ecosystems. They
can grow on their own since they are also autotrophic, organisms that produces their own food,
the physical factors that promotes their growth are the moisture content in the air and amount
of sunlight. They thrive even in rock surfaces where soil nutrients is deficient. These types of
organisms are what we called the pioneer organisms which starts the ecological succession or
the process in which ecological community changes overtime(Sahney, S. & Benton M.J., 2008),
since they are the organisms that grow first in a place even in harsh conditions, like extremely
low or high temperature.
The next part of the exercise is the observation of heterotrophs in the ecosystems. The
heterotrophs are the animals that eats the plants for nutrients and energy, since they cannot
produce their own food, and an example of a heterotroph is a human. However, animals found
in the ecosystems, both in forest and edible landscaping, benefit from plants in many other
ways aside from nutrients and energy uptaking. Ants for example make trees in the forest as
their home, as well as termites, while they slowly eat the plants part by part. Another example
is spiders, many of the spiders build their webs as their home and hunting ground in many
branches of plants. And the last example is birds, which builds their nest on trees and lay their
eggs.
According to Huggh Murray, animals are incalculably more numerous than plants. Plants
are mainly stationary, and become dispersed only in distant regions by natures different ways
such as birds who eat the seeds of plants, while animals are moving.therefore, when a natural
disaster happens, like forest fire, birds can fly and be safe, while plants cannot. Moreover,
plants cannot grow in many regions with extremely harsh conditions, while animals can. To
summarize, plants are not that diversed as animals.
The physical factors that were observed to affect the animals are wind velocity,
precipitation, relative humidity, soil, sunlight, temperature.
As stated earlier, relative humidity affects temperature. In the forest where the air has
moisture content, degradation of dead organic matters is faster, since humid environment
promotes the growth of soil cockroaches and other animals that feed on DOM, while in edible
landscaping, places with high moisture contents was observed to support the growth of
mosquitoes since mosquitoe lay their eggs on water, and places with high moisture content can
result to wet soil. Moreover, in the forest, many microconsumers were found, because many
small plants and leaves wither and die due to lack of sunlight. Lastly, wind velocity and
precipitation affects the flight of flying animals like dragonflies and birds. When it is raining,
flying organisms cannot fly, therefore, they cannot eat, and they may die. In addition,
pollinating organisms like bees and butterflies cannot go to plants, thus affects the growth of
plants in terms of producing new offsprings.
In addition, when the forest ecosystem was visited, the rotten smell of a dead rat was all
over the place, this may indicate the presence of snakes which eat rats. This type of relations is
called prey and predator relationship, and as seen in Table 1a and 1b, some of the animals in
the Edible landscaping and Forest ecosystem are omnivores (eats plants and other organisms)
or carnivores (eat other organisms),. This trophic relationship is illustrated in Figure 1-1 and 1-2.
This relationship is the way of the ecosystem to control the population of each specie to keep
its balance. For example, there are no dragonflies, mosquitoes number will grow rapidly, and
the plants that they eat may be insufficient for them which will result from them to moving in
another ecosystem and cause imbalance to the new ecosystem.
Moreover, in terms of distribution of heterotrophs, it was observed that many of them
are randomly distributed while some are lumped, this is because of the presence of planst that
they consume. Wherever the plants they consume are the most abundant, there the animals
will go. For example, since birds eat seed, most birds can be found flying near the cocoa trees in
edible landscaping, while butterflies are on the flowery parts, and in the forest ecosystem, fungi
are found on the forest floor where plant litters are abundant.
The third part of the exercise is the observation for the presence of mushrooms and
fungi, and a whitish structure on the soil, or the fungal soils. as stated earlier, it was observed
that fungi or mushrooms grow on the forest floor where there is abundant plant litters, while
no whitish thread-like structure was found in forest ecosystem and edible landscaping. Also
stated earlier that fungi are plant decomposersthey decompose dead organic matter of
plants and convert it to inorganic nutrients that living plants need to be able to survive. Other
organisms that functions in the ecosystem like hat of the fungi and can be found in the soil are
ants, earthworms and bacteria (Macmillan, D., 2003). And the growth of such decomposers is
promoted by the increase of moisture in the air and the lack of sunlight for the forest floor
(causes plants at the forest floor to die and be decomposed). Since these organisms eat detritus
(dead organic matters), the are part of the food chain called, detrital food chain, and the food
web that they form is detrital food web.
The last part of this exercise is the observation of a fallen log. A fallen log can be
considered an ecosystem, because it has a community of different microorganisms, fungi,
insects, and even birds that try to eat the insects, the physical environment (the log which
provides food for the decomposers, and other physical factors that affects the community), and
there is an energy flow from the fallen log to the decomposers to the birds and other
consumers that will approach the log, and material cycles as the fallen log is being degraded by
the decomposers.

Methodology
Two ecosystems located at UPLB campus namely, edible landscaping and forest ecosystem,
were visited, and the exercise was conducted on the chosen area of 10m x 10 m within the said
ecosystems.

Autotrophic Organisms

Plants growing within the area were identified and observed,, each species growing habit was
identified (whether shrub, tree, vines, herbs or creepers),, and the number (one, few or too many to
count) and distribution of each species within the area were also recorded (even, random, dumped).

Moreover, the interaction of the plants with the ecosystem was also observed. The interactions
of the plants with the physical factors of the environment (how the physical factors affect the plants,
how the plants respond to such factors, and the contribution of plants to the physical environment), and
with other plant species were recorded.

Lastly, the area was checked for the presence of other autotrophic organisms. Their names and
locations where they grow, and their relationship with the physical environment (what physical factors
affect them) were determined. Finally, they were classified based on their role on the ecosystem.

The same procedure was done for Edible landscaping and forest ecosystem.

Heterotrophic organisms

Animals within the area were observed. The common names, number, feeding type (omnivore,
carnivore, herbivore), distribution, and the benefits from the plants of each species were recorded.
Then, these animals were differentiated from plants, especially through the number of species present
in the area.

In addition, the interaction of the animals with the ecosystem was also observed,, the
relationship of each species of animals with the physical factors of the environment and other animals
was recorded.
 Then, presence of microconsumers, like fungi and whitish thread-like structure, within the area
was observed. The name of the whitish thread-like structure was first determined, before the roles of
the fungi in the ecosystem and the physical factors of the soil environment that affects the growth of
these type of organisms were determined. Same procedure was done for the edible landscaping and
the forest ecosystem.

On the last part of this exercise, a fallen log was observed, and the organisms present in it were
determined.

Conclusion
Ecosystem has three major components,, the community, physical environment, and
the material cycle and energy flow . The community is the group of different populations of
organisms present, while the physical environment is consists of the physical factors that affect
the community like temperature, wind velocity, soil nutrients and sunlight, and even other
organisms.
Each organism in the community can be positively or negatively affected by the physical
factors of the environment. Physical factors like sunlight is needed by plants to grow and
produce oxygen needed for breathing of the other organisms, however, too much sunlight may
cause the plants to wither, since the water in the soil and wind (humid) will evaporate leaving
the plants with no water to absorb and unable to survive.
Lastly, what links each organism in the community with each other and with the physical
environment is the material cycling and energy flow. Energy flow happens when an organism
consumes another organism or the trophic relationship between organisms, while material
cycle happens due to different nutrients found in many factors, such as soil nutrients like
phosphorus.
When the physical environment supports the growth of the plants (primary producers),
of course, there would be abundance of plants, and if there are many plants, many
heterotrophs can survive in the ecosystem with the plants as their food and/or habitat.
Therefore, it can be said that physical factors greatly affects the biotic factors, while biotic
factors also modify the physical environment.
Therefore, each part of the ecosystem is interconnected, maybe directly or indirectly,
hence a problem in one organism can ruin the balance of an ecosystem.
References
http://ncert.nic.in/ncerts/l/lebo114.pdf
(Regents of the University of Michigan, 2016) The ecosystem and hw it relates to sustainability
Ecology and Ecosystem conservation, Schmitz, O 2007 Island Press Washington DC
sahney

Life in a deciduous forest Dianne M. Macmillan, Lerner Publication Company

2003 Minneapolis USA

An encyclopedia of geography comprising a complete description of the earth 1844

London A. spottiswoode murray H