Ecology studies how animals live in their natural habitats.

• Food Chains and Food Webs
• Adaptions
• Resources

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​Food chains are diagrams that show the order that organisms are eaten in. Food chains are made up of producers and consumers. A producer is an organism that produces energy but a consumer is an animal that takes in the energy. However, sometimes different organisms are eaten by more than one predator (an animal that hunts down smaller animals) in which a food web is used. A food web looks similar to a food chain but is more confusing.

The classification system is used to classify animals.
The Classification System (Dear King Phillip Came Over For Good Spaghetti):
·         (Domain)
·         Kingdom
·         Phylum
·         Class
·         Order
·         Family
·         Genus
·         Species

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Above: A simple food chain.
Below: A simple food web.

This is a simple food web, in truth they get a lot more complicated. There are literally thousands of food webs out there due to there being so many different animals/ species meaning there is a massive amount of ways each one can get eaten.
While food webs may seem complicated and intimidating, they are in fact very simple. Take one of the routes of the Phytoplankton -> it is eaten by Krill which is eaten by Penguins which are eaten by Leopard Seals which are eaten by Killer Whales/ Orca. However, this is only one way in which the Phytoplankton is eaten and there are others, so many others and this is why food webs are complicated.
Due to the food webs being complicated, ways to differentiate which animal comes where in the food web have been created:
 - the Producer. This is the thing at the bottom of the food chain which produces its own food hence the name producer.
 - the Primary Consumer. This is the first heterotrophic (An organism that eats another organism) organism in the food web/chain
-the Secondary Consumer. This organism consumes the primary consumer
-the Tertiary Consumer. This organism consumes the secondary consumer and tends to be at the top of the food chain/food web in most simple ones
-the Decomposers. These organisms like bacteria and fungi are saprotrophic (organisms that break down the large insoluble molecules in dead matter into smaller soluble molecules) and break down dead matter
​- the Predators. These are living organisms that eat other living organisms which can run away/ defend themselves, so the Venus flytrap is a predator, while a pig is not.

Adaptations are features of an organism that helps it to survive and reproduce in its natural environment. Adaptations can be:

• Physical features - e.g: Beak, fin, scales, fur, etc
• Behavioral features - e.g: Migration, nervousness, hibernation, etc
• Physiological - e.g: Warm/cold blooded

Lets take a lion for example: A lion has a tail for good balance; it has good ears which can here its prey from far away; it has strong teeth to chew up its prey; and it has 4 legs to run fast so that it can catch its prey quickly. Also, lions hunt at night because it means that they don't have to fight during the heat of the desert.
Biotic factors are certain factors of an environment that effect if an animal can live there. These factors are:

• The amount and type of food
• The number of predators in the environment
• Disease

Abiotic factors are non-living chemical and physical parts of the environment that affect living organisms and the functioning of ecosystems. This could be:

• The temperature of the environment
• the terrain of the environment