OCEAN HABITATA. Ocean Zones and Conditions:

- Abiotic Factors: the non-living factors of the environment that an organism lives in.

- biotic Factors: the living organisms of the environment.

- Ecosystem: A community of different but interdependent species and their non-living environment.

OCEAN ZONES (PAGE 188)

1. Intertidal zone: the area that lies between the low-tide and the high-tide line.

2. Neritic zone: the first 200 meters of ocean water, which includes the seashore and most of the continental shelf.

3. Oceanic zone (open ocean): extends from 200 meters deep all the way down to the bottom of the ocean.

PHYSICAL CONDITIONS

The ocean zone will determine the type of organisms that will be found there.

Fauna: animals Flora: plants

LIFE IN THE OCEAN

Organisms are classified by where they live and how they move.

1. Plankton – algae likea) Diatoms: Microscopic algae with plate-like structures

composed of silica.b) Phytoplankton: the plant and algae components of the

plankton; the primary producers of most ocean food webs.c) Zooplankton: Animal component of the plankton that feed on

phytoplankton and other zooplankton (primary consumer).

2. Nekton: free-swimming organisms whose movements are independent of the tides, currents, and waves.

LIFE IN THE OCEAN (CONT.)

3. benthos: organisms that live on or in the ocean floor.

4. Relationship among organisms: working together to as producers and consumers.

a) Consumers: feed on other organisms because they can not make their own food.

b) Producers: a living thing that produces its own food with itself, usually by using sunlight energy.

5. Ocean food web/chain: a hierarchy of food relationships from the simplest to most complex.