Living Environment Quiz
Questions: 16 · 10 minutes
1. A pesticide sharply reduces an insect population in a field. Which short-term change is most likely among birds that feed mainly on those insects?
Their population immediately increases because competition disappears
They become producers and make their own food
Their population declines as a major food source becomes scarce
They stop being affected by other parts of the food web
2. A disease severely reduces one plant species in two grasslands. Why might the grassland with more plant species maintain ecosystem functions more effectively?
Greater diversity prevents every organism from becoming ill
Other species may continue filling similar ecological roles
Greater diversity eliminates competition for resources
Other species will automatically evolve immunity to the disease
3. Bees obtain nectar from flowers while transferring pollen between them. What type of interaction does this illustrate?
Predation
Parasitism
Competition
Mutualism
4. A deer population grows for several years, then remains near the same size as food and nesting cover become limited. What best explains the leveling off?
The population is near the habitat's carrying capacity
The deer have become a different species
The deer have entered primary succession
The ecosystem no longer contains limiting factors
5. A persistent pollutant becomes more concentrated at each higher trophic level in an aquatic food web. Which organisms are likely to contain the highest concentrations?
Top predators that consume many contaminated prey
Herbivorous insects that eat the algae
Algae that absorb a small amount from the water
Plants outside the affected watershed
6. A highway divides a forest and isolates two animal populations. Which action would most directly improve movement and gene flow between them?
Building a vegetated wildlife corridor across the barrier
Removing predators from both forest sections
Adding fertilizer throughout the forest
Introducing a new competing species
7. In a grassland food web, which organism captures energy from sunlight and makes it available to consumers?
Grass
Grasshopper
Hawk
Decomposer fungus
8. Plants in a habitat cannot directly use most atmospheric nitrogen gas. Which process converts nitrogen into forms that can enter food webs?
Transpiration
Nitrogen fixation
Cellular respiration
Evaporation
9. Which process removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and incorporates its carbon into sugars?
Cellular respiration
Decomposition
Photosynthesis
Combustion
10. After lava cools into bare rock on a new island, which organisms are most likely to help begin primary succession?
Large grazing mammals
Mature forest trees
Lichens and other pioneer species
Top-level predators
11. A nonnative plant arrives without its usual herbivores and spreads rapidly, crowding out local plants. Which explanation best fits this change?
The introduced plant has changed from a consumer into a producer
The local plants have all reached carrying capacity independently
The introduced plant has become invasive under favorable conditions
The habitat has stopped exerting natural selection
12. Which term includes a community of organisms together with the nonliving parts of their surroundings?
Habitat
Biome
Population
Ecosystem
13. Which event is generally a density-independent factor affecting a rabbit population?
Competition for limited food
A severe wildfire
Spread of a contagious disease
Increased predation as rabbits become abundant
14. A population grows rapidly at first but slows as food, territory, and other resources become harder to obtain. Which model best describes this pattern?
An unlimited exponential decline
Logistic growth approaching carrying capacity
Primary succession toward a climax community
A random pattern unrelated to resources
15. If atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations rise while other factors remain unchanged, what effect is most directly expected?
Earth loses its natural greenhouse effect entirely
All incoming sunlight is blocked before reaching Earth's surface
Photosynthesis immediately stops in every biome
More outgoing infrared energy is retained, contributing to warming
16. Fertilizer runoff adds large amounts of nitrogen and phosphorus to a lake. Which sequence is most likely?
Fish increase, nutrients disappear, and the water becomes permanently clearer
Aquatic plants stop photosynthesizing, causing atmospheric oxygen to rise
Decomposers disappear because nutrients are too abundant
Algae multiply, decomposition increases, and dissolved oxygen falls