Chapter 3, Problem 15STP

Summary Introduction

To determine:

The difference between the establishment of the climax community in the primary and the secondary succession.

Introduction:

The ecological succession can be defined as a process, which causes the changes in the species structure in an ecological community over the time. It could be of two types, primary and secondary. Primary succession takes place where the life has not existed in past, and the secondary succession takes place, where some life form has existed before.

Explanation of Solution

The climax community is the final stage of the succession, in which the resources present in the ecosystem is getting utilized at its best and the population of every organism is managed and properly intervened. The climax community in the primary succession takes time and in secondary succession, the climax community is reached early.

In the primary succession, where there was no life form before, no soil existed, the climatic conditions were generally not favorable, the spores of the plants were absent, and no source of nutrition was present. Everything in primary succession needs to be started from basic level. In the case of secondary succession, the climatic conditions are not that harsh, generally they have more chances of having spores and seeds of the plants. Also, the conditions of soil become favorable to help the new vegetation flourish in a less amount of time.

In the primary succession, the community would be more of grasses and the tall trees. Although in secondary succession, the layering of the stratified communities is very common.