What does ecological succession?

Answer 1

A gradual change in the ecosystem I actually just took an ecology class last year. Succession was one of the things we studied. If I had taken it more recently, I could be more specific with the ecological terms. As it is, I'll explaing it in laymens terms! Basically, succession is the establishment of life forms in an environment. Think about it like this. If we were to clear a parcel of land completely of everything, all the trees and plant life, eventually plant life would return. The first plants to return are going to be small ones, like weeds! These smaller plants are often necessary for other larger plant forms to inhabit the habitat. Sometimes, it's just the decay of dead parts as they complete their life cycle. This is the 'first generation' in succession. After the first generation improves on the conditions of the site, other plant life will take root and so on. Second and third generation plants. This also happens with wild life. Think about the food chain. If plant life in a habitat, you might not have grazing herbivores, such as deer. Without deer, their predatores will not live in those areas and will consequently migrate to other areas where they will be successful. An ecologist could explain it better, but that is the basic idea. Hope this helps,