Environmental and Wildlife Glossary
Biology and nature vocabulary can be difficult! When we write documents about wildlife content, it's not easy to use the words correctly. Here are 20 terms you can use if you have to talk about nature.
- biodiversity
- noun
- The variety of life in the world or in a particular habitat or ecosystem.
- Example: Predators are always at the top of the food chain, without them BIODIVERSITY's wouldn't be as they are.
- en: biodiversité
- ecosystem
- noun
- A dynamic community of living organisms (biotic components like plants, animals, and microbes) interacting with each other and their non-living physical environment (abiotic components like sunlight, soil, water, and air) in a specific area.
- Example: Downstream, a reduced flow rate may have a significant effect on the aquatic ECOSYSTEM- up to 35% of fresh water fish are thought to have become extinct or endangered as a result of dams.
- en: écosystème
- habitat
- noun
- The natural home or environment of an animal, plant, or other organism.
- Example: However, this method is a good measurement to study on the relationship between the distribution of species in a certain area and the HABITAT. 2) Line transects The chosen transects in the area are walked or driven by observers within a set period of time in this method.
- en: habitat
- food chain
- noun
- A hierarchical series of organisms each dependent on the next as a source of food.
- Example: The remaining amount is released into surrounding ecosystems and enters the FOOD CHAIN, affecting animal populations at every trophic level.
- en: chaîne alimentaire
- food web
- noun
- A complex, interconnected network of multiple overlapping food chains, illustrating the various pathways that energy and nutrients take through an ecosystem.
- Example: This has been known to cause problems further up the FOOD WEB due to the accumulation of toxins in top carnivores.
- en: réseau trophique
- predator
- noun
- An animal that naturally preys on others.
- Example: It is a topic in this area which we will seek to study in this paper, the topic being PREDATOR-Prey population interaction.
- en: prédateur
- prey
- noun
- An animal that is caught and killed by another for food.
- Example: The animals that do appear are 'PREY' animals that would have been very common and part of life for the Palaeolithic hunter.
- en: proie
- decomposer
- noun
- An organism, especially a soil bacterium, fungus, or invertebrate, that decomposes organic material.
- Example: Increased dead root material is a resource for DECOMPOSER organisms in the soil and could change microorganism community structure and act as subsequent source of nutrients for plant growth.
- en: décomposeur
- photosynthesis
- noun
- He process by which green plants and some other organisms use sunlight to synthesize foods from carbon dioxide and water. Photosynthesis in plants generally involves the green pigment chlorophyll and generates oxygen as a byproduct.
- Example: For PHOTOSYNTHESIS to occur, there needs to be a supply of carbon dioxide, water, and light energy.
- en: photosynthèse
- adaptation
- noun
- A change or the process of change by which an organism or species becomes better suited to its environment.
- Example: Mutations can slowly add new genetic variation to populations and may produce novel phenotypic affects that selection can assemble into ADAPTATION.
- en: adaptation
- evolution
- noun
- The process by which animals, plants, and other living organisms are transformed into different forms by the accumulation of changes over successive generations.
- Example: This hominid subsequently gave rise to all modern human populations, simultaneously in multiple regions, through a process of in situ EVOLUTION.
- en: évolution
- natural selection
- noun
- A fundamental mechanism of evolution where organisms better adapted to their environment tend to survive and produce more offspring.
- Example: In his Origin of Species he explains how NATURAL SELECTION does not proliferate characteristics that are beneficial to another species, claiming that he 'would almost as soon believe that the cat curls the end of its tail when preparing to spring, in order to warn the doomed mouse'. NATURAL SELECTION is selfish.
- en: sélection naturelle
- population
- noun
- A particular section, group, or type of people or animals living in an area or country.
- Example: There are large sugar estates which are for the most part owned by about 2 percent of the POPULATION - namely the Franco-Mauritians.
- en: population
- species
- noun
- A group of living organisms consisting of similar individuals capable of exchanging genes or interbreeding.
- Example: A ditch that caries excess water off the track is presently overgrown by bramble SPECIES.
- en: espèces
- ecological niche
- noun
- The range of resources and conditions allowing the species to maintain a viable population.
- Example: Consequently, the species are of medium size, lightly built, slender and long limbed (Fig 3), all of which means they are perfectly adapted to moving quickly in their present ECOLOGICAL NICHE.
- en: niche écologique
- symbiosis
- noun
- Interaction between two different organisms living in close physical association, typically to the advantage of both.
- Example: Both hypotheses agree in the suggestion of an anaerobic metabolism for the origin of mitochondrial SYMBIOSIS.
- en: symbiose
- mutualism
- noun
- Symbiosis that is beneficial to both organisms involved.
- Example: There is a spectrum of symbiosis: Commensalism -where only one of the organisms benefits but does not harm the other to any significance, MUTUALISM -where both symbionts benefit, and finally Parasitism -only one organism (here called the parasite) benefits from the relationship but at the detriment of the host.
- en: mutualisme
- parasitism
- noun
- The practice of living as a parasite in or on another organism.
- Example: PARASITISM -only one organism (here called the parasite) benefits from the relationship but at the detriment of the host.
- en: parasitisme
- competition
- noun
- Interaction between organisms, populations, or species, in which birth, growth and death depend on gaining a share of a limited environmental resource.
- Example: 'Female COMPETITION-conditional transfer', where male dispersal is influenced by female spatio-temporal distribution (Altmann, 1990) is therefore common.
- en: compétition
- climate change
- noun
- A change in global or regional climate patterns, in particular a change apparent from the mid to late 20th century onwards and attributed largely to the increased levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide produced by the use of fossil fuels.
- Example: Although 'CLIMATE CHANGE' has become synonymous with 'global warming' scientists use the term in a wider sense including also natural changes in climate.
- en: changement climatique
