Deck 19: Community Succession

Question 1

Over the course of terrestrial succession, what is the general pattern of species richness?

A) a constant increase over time
B) an increase followed by an abrupt decline
C) no change over time
D) an increase that plateaus, followed by a slight decline
E) a decline followed by an abrupt increase

Answer 1

D

Question 2

Which of the following is a pioneer species?

A) annual plants with small, light seeds
B) plants with large, heavy seeds
C) animals that stay affixed to a substrate, like sea anemones
D) animals that tend to stay very close to where they were born

Answer 2

A

Question 3

A climax community is generally composed of organisms

A) that dominate in a given biome.
B) that were present throughout succession.
C) from surrounding communities.
D) that are common.

Answer 3

A

Question 4

Why were wind- and sea-dispersed seeds the first to colonize and survive on Krakatau?

A) The seeds of these plants were more resistant to dry conditions than those of animal-dispersed plants.
B) In the early days of colonization, there were no forests to attract animals that could disperse seeds.
C) Plants with wind-dispersed seeds were able to survive the volcanic blast better than animal-dispersed plants
D) Animal-dispersed plant seeds are more likely to be digested than wind- and sea-dispersed plants.

Question 5

The receding glacier at Glacier Bay in the U.S. state of Alaska has been used to study

A) competition.
B) predation.
C) succession.
D) nutrient cycling.

Question 6

The last seral stage in the process of succession is called the _____ community.

A) apex
B) baseline
C) climax
D) final

Question 7

Development of communities in habitats that are initially devoid of plants and organic soil is known as _____ succession.

A) climax
B) initial
C) secondary
D) primary

Question 8

Succession is best studied using

A) indirect observations.
B) chronosequences.
C) pollen.
D) direct observations.

Question 9

When succession was initially observed on the islands of Krakatau, plants with _____ seeds dominated.

A) animal-dispersed
B) wind-dispersed
C) sea-dispersed
D) ballistic-dispersed

Question 10

Primary succession

A) begins with soil containing organic matter.
B) lasts much longer than secondary succession.
C) has rarely occurred in terrestrial environments.
D) usually begins with lichens and mosses.

Question 11

The age of pollen grain is determined using

A) carbon dating.
B) elemental dating.
C) chronosequences.
D) seral dating.

Question 12

Succession studied at Glacier Bay, Alaska, in the United States, and on the island of Krakatau, Indonesia, has been done using

A) direct observations.
B) indirect observations.
C) chronosequences.
D) pollen.

Question 13

How could you tell for certain if a plant lived 2000 years ago in a pond sediment sample?

A) carbon dating of pollen
B) tree rings
C) construction of a pond followed by direct observation.
D) observation of a chronosequence near the pond

Question 14

Succession is change in _____ over time.

A) species interactions
B) species competition
C) species composition
D) land use

Question 15

Why might direct observation of succession be easier in intertidal communities than in terrestrial communities?

A) It is easier to see all of the organisms in an intertidal area.
B) Facilitation happens less easily in terrestrial communities, which makes it more difficult to see transitions among seral stages.
C) There are many more organisms in a forest than in an intertidal area.
D) Organisms in an intertidal area have shorter generation times than organisms in terrestrial communities.

Question 16

A pioneer species is ??_____ species to arrive at a site.

A) the final
B) the penultimate
C) one of the first
D) the first

Question 17

Each stage of community change during succession is called a _____ stage.

A) succession
B) seral
C) serial
D) community

Question 18

A sequence of communities that exist over time at a given location is

A) a transient climax community.
B) never found without soil or organic material.
C) a chronosequence.
D) an example of secondary succession.
E) always showing the same sequence in intertidal areas.

Question 19

Indirect observations of succession are often done by using

A) chronosequences and seral stages.
B) seral stages and climax communities.
C) climax communities and pollen.
D) chronosequences and pollen.

Question 20

To apply the concept of chronosequence, ecologists assume that:

A) most terrestrial communities go through the same seral stages.
B) the layers in pond sediments are stacked from youngest at the top to the oldest at the bottom.
C) older sites and younger sites have undergone the same disturbances.
D) wider tree rings represent periods of rapid population growth.

Question 21

Why does secondary succession occur faster than primary succession?

A) Direct observation of secondary succession is easier than for primary succession.
B) Lichens are better able to colonize soil than bare rock.
C) Soil in secondary sites can contain plant seeds and roots.
D) Primary succession areas get too much sunlight for succession to happen quickly.

Question 22

Succession in aquatic environments

A) is often faster than succession in terrestrial environments.
B) is often slower than succession in terrestrial environments.
C) has more seral stages than succession in terrestrial environments.
D) never reaches a climax community.

Question 23

Which type of succession would be expected to be the slowest?

A) intertidal
B) lake
C) stream
D) All of these types of succession are equally slow.

Question 24

Stream succession is rapid because

A) disturbed sites receive constant inputs of nutrients via runoff.
B) organisms that live in streams have rapid growth rates.
C) organisms can move downstream from less disturbed sites.
D) disturbances that occur in stream communities are often not severe.

Question 25

If you were assigned the task of starting a plant community that could thrive on Mars, where there is no soil on the surface, which might be good to bring for the initial colonization?

A) alders
B) pines
C) lichens
D) low-growing bushes
E) cacti

Question 26

Researchers have recently proposed a new way lake succession can occur. What is one feature of this new model?

A) Lake succession is slow and steady.
B) Colonization of plants happens from the lakeshore.
C) Colonization of plants happens from the sediments at the lake bottom.
D) The production of a peat layer is not necessary in lake succession.

Question 27

Why does stream succession rely less on how fast organisms can move themselves than terrestrial succession?

A) Most streams are short.
B) Water can carry organisms from less disturbed to more disturbed sites.
C) Most stream organisms are algae.
D) Succession happens very slowly in streams.

Question 28

When succession was studied at the Duke Forest in the Piedmont region of North Carolina, how many years did it take for the forest to revert to deciduous climax forest from agricultural field?

A) 300 years
B) 200 years
C) 150 years
D) 50 years

Question 29

You observe three beech-maple forests in Indiana that began as ponds. How might you determine whether they all started succession with the same community composition?

A) carbon-date the maple and beech trees to see how long they have been living; older trees would suggest a more diverse starting community
B) calculate the species diversity of lichens found on the trees
C) try growing different types of pioneer species at each site
D) sample the soils at each site for pollen and carbon-date them to get an estimate of the species that appeared first at the site

Question 30

Which of the following is NOT an example of a habitat that could undergo primary succession?

A) lava flow
B) parking lot
C) tree-fall gap
D) sand dune

Question 31

Which of the following habitats could NOT undergo secondary succession?

A) mud slide
B) bare rock
C) clear-cut forest
D) severely burned forest

Question 32

What role does disturbance play in the recently discovered mechanism of pond succession that isn't found in the classical mechanism of succession?

A) Droughts lower water levels so that plants can colonize lake sediments.
B) Rushing water scours the bottom of the lakes, allowing diatoms to colonize.
C) Glaciers scour the land, leaving depressions that can fill up with melting water.
D) Peat fires remove the vegetation, allowing secondary succession to proceed.

Question 33

Which is true about terrestrial succession?

A) Initial conditions do not affect the trajectory of succession.
B) Primary and secondary succession result in different climax communities.
C) The sequence of seral stages is variable.
D) The sequence of seral stages is linear.

Question 34

Succession in intertidal communities is rapid because

A) the climax community has only a small number of species.
B) the generation time of the dominant species is shorter.
C) species easily disperse into the disturbed habitat.
D) algae have a very rapid growth rate.

Question 35

In the study of stream succession following a major flood event at Sycamore Creek in Arizona, what was the first organism to recolonize the stream?

A) fish
B) Cladophora
C) cyanobacteria
D) diatoms

Question 36

Why does succession in intertidal communities tend to happen faster than succession after a disturbance in terrestrial communities?

A) The ocean has a higher concentration of organisms than soil.
B) There are many more disturbances in the intertidal zones than in terrestrial areas.
C) The generation time of dominant species in the intertidal zone is shorter than that of the dominant species in terrestrial habitats.
D) The generation time of dominant species in terrestrial habitats is shorter than that of the dominant species in the intertidal zone.

Question 37

Can you tell what plant seral state you are in by looking at the bird species in a given area?

A) Yes, because bird species are usually associated with a particular seral stage.
B) Yes, because each bird species eats only a particular type of plant.
C) No, because some bird species are associated with many plant seral stages.
D) No, because birds eat a wide variety of insects as well.

Question 38

In primary succession of sand dunes, the first species to colonize are

A) lichens.
B) grasses.
C) herbs.
D) mosses.

Question 39

What is the clearest way to document succession?

A) pollen sediments from a pond
B) direct observation
C) tree rings
D) carbon dating of wood

Question 40

Secondary succession takes place in habitats that

A) are initially devoid of plants and organic soil.
B) have some plants following disturbance.
C) have some plants following disturbance but do not have organic soil.
D) have been disturbed and contain no plants but still contain organic soil.

Question 41

Why are there no spruces in the early seral stages of succession at Glacier Bay?

A) Spruce seeds are not likely to disperse to the pioneer and low-shrub stages.
B) Spruce seedlings are inhibited by the presence of low shrubs.
C) Spruce seedlings are not tolerant to the environmental fluctuations in the pioneer stage.
D) There are few alder trees in the early seral stages to facilitate spruce establishment.

Question 42

How do herbivores affect the outcome of succession in intertidal zones?

A) They alter the abiotic environment with their waste products.
B) They forage on particular types of algae, allowing others to dominate.
C) They trample algae, allowing sea anemones to colonize.
D) They have little effect on the outcome of succession.

Question 43

One of the traits common in late-succession plant species is

A) small seed size.
B) low root-to-shoot ratio.
C) fast growth rate.
D) few seeds.

Question 44

Jaccard's index quantifies

A) similarity between communities.
B) differences between communities.
C) community diversity.
D) community species richness.

Question 45

(Figure 19.11) Given the results in the figure, what might prevent a tree with large seeds, like a chestnut, from establishing in a forest with high densities of sweet birch seeds, an early-succession species?

A) The sweet birch seeds would germinate and grow faster, crowding out the chestnut saplings.
B) A chestnut seed would never be transported a large distance to the sweet birch forest.
C) Sweet birch seedlings exude chemicals that block the germination of chestnut seeds.
D) Chestnut seeds, being large, are more likely to be attacked by insects than sweet birch seeds.

Question 46

What characteristic shared by diatoms and cyanobacteria might make them good colonizers of nutrient-poor habitats?

A) They are both extremely tough to eat.
B) They are both unicellular.
C) They both photosynthesize light to make carbohydrates.
D) They both have adaptations that allow them to survive droughts.

Question 47

Typical colonizers in primary succession are mosses and lichens that inhabit bare rock. What colonizers in primary succession do not inhabit bare rock?

Question 48

What information about species is needed to calculate Jaccard's index?

A) diversity
B) growth rate
C) those present
D) mortality

Question 49

Topic succession in terrestrial environments
Level: medium
The assumptions behind the valid use of chronosequences are usually not all met. How, then, do researchers establish the most likely scenario of terrestrial succession in a given area?

Question 50

Why do plants in early seral stages exhibit high levels of tolerance?

A) Early plants cannot inhibit the growth of other plants.
B) Early plants must deal with harsh conditions, such as fluctuating temperatures.
C) Early plants are poor competitors and thus must tolerate other plants.
D) Early plants have small and light seeds that germinate well under shade.

Question 51

Early-succession species are likely to have

A) wind-dispersed seeds.
B) high shade tolerance.
C) short seed viability.
D) large size at maturity.

Question 52

What are the characteristics of plants found immediately after a drought in a pond?

A) They have few large seeds.
B) They have low root-to-shoot ratios.
C) They are large and have high tolerance to shade.
D) They have extremely slow growth rates.

Question 53

Which of the following is NOT a trait of a pioneer species?

A) many seeds
B) shade tolerant
C) small seeds
D) fast growing

Question 54

Describe the process that forms bogs in lakes.

Question 55

Which of the following is TRUE about succession?

A) Species richness initially increases with time in aquatic succession.
B) Species richness initially increases with time in terrestrial succession.
C) Both a and b are true.
D) Neither a nor b is true.

Question 56

When seeds of early- and late-succession species were raised under low light conditions similar to those found in the understorey of mature forest, researchers found that species with _____ seeds had _____ seedling survivorship in shade.

A) small; high
B) small; low
C) large; high
D) There was no relation between seed size and seedling survivorship.

Question 57

(Figure 19.10) These graphs show that succession is associated with a rapid increase in species richness that slows and levels off over time. How might you explain a graph showing succession with an initial increase in species richness followed by a decline in species richness over time?

A) a disturbance such as fire
B) facilitation
C) inhibition
D) tolerance

Question 58

Late-succession species are likely to have

A) wind-dispersed seeds.
B) large seeds.
C) many seeds.
D) fast growth rate.

Question 59

Why must oxygen concentrations remain at low levels for pond succession to occur?

A) High oxygen levels would cause succession to run too quickly, leaving no climax community.
B) High oxygen levels increase the chance of drought in areas around the pond.
C) Low oxygen levels allow for easier colonization of plants at the pond edge.
D) Low oxygen levels decrease decomposition rates, resulting in peat production.

Question 60

When considering the effect of one species on the probability of a second species becoming established, facilitation is_____, inhibition is _____, and tolerance is _____.

A) neutral; positive; negative
B) positive; neutral; negative
C) positive; negative; neutral
D) negative; positive; neutral

Question 61

Experimental removal of a single species in a succession would:

A) help determine whether that species facilitated the growth of a later-succession species.
B) usually have very little effect on succession.
C) can happen only in the intertidal zones.
D) always increase the energy available for climax species.

Question 62

Garlic mustard (Alliaria petiolata) is a common invasive species in the eastern United States. One mechanism that allows it to dominate in some areas is the production of chemicals that interfere with the ability of other plants to gain nutrients through mutualistic fungi. This mechanism is an example of:

A) tolerance.
B) inhibition.
C) the priority effect.
D) facilitation.

Question 63

Some of the first species to colonize an area following disturbance have to persevere under inhospitable conditions such as disturbed soils, low soil moisture, and altered nutrient levels. This is an example of

A) the priority effect.
B) facilitation.
C) inhibition.
D) tolerance.

Question 64

Which mechanism of succession is independent of the presence or absence of other species?

A) inhibition
B) tolerance
C) facilitation
D) facilitation and tolerance

Question 65

Which of the following is NOT an example of inhibition?

A) A species outcompetes another species.
B) A species suppresses other species using allelopathy.
C) A species casts deep shade to prevent growth of another species.
D) A species acts as a nurse plant and increases water available to other species.

Question 66

Why is tolerance a mechanism that can be found in both early and late seral stages?

A) Both early and late seral species need to be tolerant to low levels of moisture.
B) Both early and late seral species require high temperatures to germinate.
C) Early seral species need tolerance of stressful environments, while late seral species need tolerance of deep shade.
D) Early seral species are tolerant to insects and late seral species are tolerant to fire.

Question 67

If a legume inhibits the growth of other plants around it by using noxious chemicals,

A) the plant will eventually kill itself with the chemicals.
B) nitrogen will build up in the soil over time.
C) no birds will come to the area to help distribute the legume's seeds.
D) the legume's bacteria will die off, killing the plant.

Question 68

Inhibition is a mechanism of succession in which

A) the probability that a species can become established depends on the presence of another species.
B) the arrival of one species at a site affects the subsequent colonization of other species.
C) one species decreases the probability that a second species will become established.
D) one species increases the probability that a second species will become established.

Question 69

Which mechanisms of succession depend on one species arriving at a site before another species?

A) inhibition and tolerance
B) facilitation and inhibition
C) tolerance and facilitation
D) inhibition, facilitation, and tolerance

Question 70

A mechanism of succession in which the presence of one species increases the probability that a second species can become established is

A) facilitation.
B) tolerance.
C) inhibition.
D) priority effect.

Question 71

_____ is a mechanism of succession in which the probability that a species can establish itself depends on its dispersal ability and its ability to persist under the physical conditions of the environment.

A) Facilitation
B) Inhibition
C) Tolerance
D) Resilience

Question 72

A type of beetle feeds on the growing stems of young plants. What type of plant-early-succession or late-succession-would it most likely specialize on and why?

Question 73

Electrical companies have discovered that dense shrub thickets, once established, can prevent growth of trees under power lines. Which mechanism of succession are these companies using by planting shrubs under power lines?

A) facilitation
B) inhibition
C) tolerance
D) shade tolerance

Question 74

How could a priority effect be important in the mechanism of facilitation?

Question 75

Suppose two species of trees are able to colonize an area disturbed by fire. One species typically grows to 5 metres, while the other species tends to stay under 2 metres in height. The two species have seeds of the same shape that are relatively light. Which one is more likely to colonize the disturbed area and why?

Question 76

Legumes contain nitrogen-fixing bacteria in their roots that increase soil nitrogen for use by other species. This is an example of

A) inhibition.
B) tolerance.
C) suppression.
D) facilitation.

Question 77

The priority effect occurs when

A) the first species to arrive at a site have a greater probability of becoming established than subsequent species.
B) the first species to arrive at a site have a lower probability of becoming established than subsequent species.
C) the arrival of one species at a site affects the subsequent colonization of other species.
D) the arrival of one species at a site improves conditions so there is an increased probability of subsequent species becoming established.

Question 78

(Figure 9.12) In the experiment associated with the figure, acorn barnacles facilitate the growth of algae. If you removed both acorn barnacles and the limpet predators of algae, what would you be likely to observe over time?

A) a dense carpet of little brown barnacles only
B) a carpet of little brown barnacles followed by algal growth
C) no colonization of any organisms
D) a dense carpet of algae only

Question 79

Plants _____ should be used for initial seeding of abandoned strip mines.

A) with few large seeds
B) that are adapted to fire
C) with high tolerance to shade
D) with long seed viability
E) with high root-to-shoot ratios

Question 80

In the study of intertidal communities in the U.S. state of Oregon, little brown barnacles (Chthamalus dalii) are first to colonize disturbed areas. Over time, the community is dominated by the acorn barnacle (Balanus glandula). Which mechanism of succession explains the relationship between the two species of barnacles?

A) tolerance
B) facilitation
C) inhibition
D) none of the above