Cycles in Ecosystems / Quiz

Cycles in Ecosystems / Quiz

Multiple Choice

What are decomposers?

• organisms that get energy from eating other living organisms

• organisms that get energy from breaking down waste and dead organisms

• organisms that produce their own energy

Multiple Select

Fungi are decomposers that can break down dead trees in a forest ecosystem. What would happen in a forest without these decomposers.

Select all choices that are true.

• There would be no food for trees, so many trees would die.

• There would be no space for new trees and plants to grow.

• The forest would be crowded with dead trees and dead plant matter.

Multiple Choice

Where are the decomposers in this diagram?

• around the outside of this food chain diagram.

• in the center of this food chain diagram.

Multiple Choice

What is one way this diagram could be improved to show the role of decomposers in an ecosystem.

• The Sun could be removed from the chart, since it doesn't play a role in a food chain.

• There could be arrows pointing from the decomposers to the plants labeled nutrients

• All of the consumers could be removed from the chart since they are not helped by decomposers.

Multiple Choice

All plants can use the nitrogen that is in a gas form in Earth's atmosphere.

Multiple Choice

Which of the following is NOT a way that nitrogen compounds can be formed?

• Decomposers break down dead organisms and return nitrogen compounds to the soil.

• Some special kinds of bacteria can take in nitrogen from the air and turn it into nitrogen compounds

• Lightning can burn the air and cause nitrogen in the atmosphere to combine with other chemicals.

• Some animals create nitrogen compounds using energy from the Sun.

Multiple Choice

How does this elephant get the nitrogen it needs to live and grow?

• It gets nitrogen when it is struck by lightning.

• It gets nitrogen by eating plants.

• It gets nitrogen from the Sun warming its body.

Multiple Choice

A farmer notices that her crops are very unhealthy. What is one way she could help her plants?

• She could take all of the earthworms and decomposers out of the soil that might be eating the crops.

• Shc could cover the crops in plastic and pump in more nitrogen in the form of gas.

• She could add a fertilizer that contains nitrogen compounds to her crops.

• She could add more metal cages on top of her crops and hope that lightning will strike them

Multiple Choice

A farmer adding nitrogen-rich fertilizer to her crops is most like which of the following scenarios?

• An injured person going through surgery.

• A person building a fence around his or her garden.

• A person putting on a warm coat in the winter.

• A person taking a vitamin.

Multiple Choice

Is there more oxygen or carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere?

Multiple Choice

What gas is released during the process of photosynthesis?

• oxygen

• carbon dioxide

Multiple Choice

What gas is released during the process of cellular respiration?

• oxygen

• carbon dioxide

Multiple Choice

Plants are the only organisms that produce food through photosynthesis and release oxygen into the atmosphere.

Multiple Select

Which of these natural processes release oxygen into the environment?

Multiple Select

A company clears away a large forest of trees to build a power plant that burns coal. How could this action impact the carbon dioxide and oxygen cycle in an ecosystem?

Select all choices that are true.

• There will be a large amount of oxygen in the ecosystem since it will not be used by the trees during photosynthesis

• There will be a large amount of carbon dixoide in the ecosystem since it is released during combustion in the power plant.

• There will be a large amount of oxygen in the ecosystem ince it is released during combustion in the power plant.

• There will be a large amount of carbon dioxide in the ecosystem since it will not be used by the trees during photosynthesis

Multiple Select

Cellular respiration is one way that living things release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Select the pictures that show other processes that release carbon dioxide into the environment.

Multiple Choice

What is a cycle?

• the process of burning a material

• a flow of materials through a system in a repeating pattern of process that happens over and over

• a gas that animals need to survive

• an organism that breaks down other organisms for energy

Multiple Choice

What is nitrogen?

• a gas that plants must have to complete photosynthesis

• a gas that animals must breathe to survive

• the process of burning a material

• a gas that makes up a majority of Earth's atmosphere.

Multiple Choice

What are nitrogen compounds?

• chemicals that contain oxygen that plants can take up through their roots

• chemicals that flow through a system in a repeating pattern or process that happens over and over

• chemicals that contain nitrogen that plants can take up through their roots

• chemicals that contain carbon dioxide that plats can take up through their roots

Multiple Choice

What is combustion?

• the process by which plants make sugars for food

• the process that animals and plants use to turn food into usable energy

• the process of burning a material

• the process by which decomposers break down dead plant and animal matter

Multiple Choice

Which organisms keep ecosystems "clean" by breaking down waste and dead organisms?

• producers

• consumers

• herbivores

• omnivores

• decomposers

Multiple Choice

The flow of materials through an ecosystem in a repeating pattern is called a _________.

• carbon cycle

• a cycle

• nutrients

• nitrogen

• combustion

Multiple Choice

Which of the following are materials that move through the ecosystem in a cycle?

• nitrogen

• carbon dioxide

• nutrients

• oxygen

• all choices are correct

Multiple Select

Which of these processes release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere?

Check all that are true.

• cellular respiration

• photosynthesis

• combustion

• a volcanic eruption