Why Are Coastal Ecosystems Generally Highly Productive

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Why Are Coastal Ecosystems Generally Highly Productive?

Coastal ecosystems are generally highly productive because they benefit from nutrients in runoff water and they’re shallow providing ample light and shelter because plants can grow in many coastal ecosystems.

Why are coastal ecosystems so highly productive?

Coastal ecosystems are generally highly productive because: They benefit from nutrient-rich runoff from land Benthic organisms can live in the upper photic zone plants provide shelter. … Pollution that results from excess nutrients in the ocean.

Why are the most productive marine ecosystems found in cold temperate environments?

why are the most productive marine ecosystems found in cold temperature regions? they have less overall sunlight but receive far more nutrients.

Which factors are necessary for the most productive marine ecosystem?

Biotic factors include plants animals and microbes important abiotic factors include the amount of sunlight in the ecosystem the amount of oxygen and nutrients dissolved in the water proximity to land depth and temperature. Sunlight is one the most important abiotic factors for marine ecosystems.

What marine ecosystem is thought by most scientists to be the most taxonomically diverse?

Coral reefs are particularly important in this regard as they are the most structurally complex and taxonomically diverse marine ecosystems providing habitat for tens of thousands of associated fishes and invertebrates.

Why coastal waters are more productive than the open ocean?

Coastal waters are more productive than the central ocean for two main reasons. First runoff from land often contains a high abundance of nutrients which get deposited in coastal waters and stimulate production.

What coastal ecosystems are among the most productive?

Estuaries. Estuaries places where rivers meet the sea are among the most productive environments for supporting commercial fisheries around the world and are vital to the economy. This makes the protection and restoration of these complex ecosystems particularly important.

What causes high productivity in the ocean?

The proximity to land and its nutrient sources the interception of sinking organic matter by the shallow seafloor and the propensity for coastal upwelling all result in highly productive ecosystems.

See also what do cells use nutrients for

Why does the ocean have low productivity?

In ocean sunlight is the main limiting factor which decreases the rate of photosynthesis. … Minerals and nutrients can also be a retarding factor based on location of the oceans.So there will be less productivity than land which is 170 billion tons compared to 55 billion tons ion oceans.

What is the most productive marine environments and why are they so productive?

Upwelling. The most productive waters of the world are in regions of upwelling. Upwelling in coastal waters brings nutrients toward the surface. Phytoplankton reproduce rapidly in these conditions and grazing zooplankton also multiply and provide abundant food supplies for nekton.

What does it mean that an ecosystem is most productive?

The world’s ecosystems vary tremendously in productivity as illustrated in the following figures. In terms of NPP per unit area the most productive systems are estuaries swamps and marshes tropical rain forests and temperate rain forests (see Figure 4).

Why do coastal regions tend to have more primary productivity?

Why does coastal upwelling lead to high biological productivity? It provides a current for fish to move up in the water column to devour the phytoplankton on the surface. It brings warm nutrient-rich water to the surface where phytoplankton reside.

Why is productivity low in tropical regions?

Biological productivity is low in tropical regions because the strong thermocline prevents the mixing of waters and movement of nutrients. Polar regions have low biological production because of the lack of sunlight.

Why are the Antarctic seas the most productive marine ecosystems?

Antarctic seas are extremely productive because phytoplankton grows abundantly during the extended daylight of summer and feeds huge populations of krill. Krill shrimplike crustaceans are a key animal in this ecosystem as food for top predators: whales penguins and seals.

Why are marine aquatic ecosystem important?

Healthy marine ecosystems are important for society since they provide services including food security feed for livestock raw materials for medicines building materials from coral rock and sand and natural defenses against hazards such as coastal erosion and inundation.

What causes most coastal pollution in the United States?

Nutrient runoff industrial waste overfishing and sewage. Amount of sunlight temperature and presence of nutrients. It is the volume not the time that harms estuaries. … Oil spills sewage and pesticides.

Why is the coral reefs the most productive ecosystem?

Coral reefs are among the most productive ecosystems on the planet with the primary producers at the base of the food chain (including corals) supporting their complex food webs. … Although light provides the energy that fuels reef productivity key nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus are also required.

What part of the ocean is the most productive and why?

Although they occupy less than two percent of the oceans the coastal upwelling areas in the eastern parts of the Pacific and Atlantic Ocean are among the biologically most productive marine areas worldwide. They not only support a large biodiversity but also provide 20 percent of the world’s fish harvest.

Is productivity higher on the land or in the sea?

(1) estimate that there is roughly 80 times more biomass on land than in the oceans. … The lower productivity of the ocean per unit area is due largely to poorer light penetration in water (2).

Why are estuaries considered to be highly productive?

Estuaries are one of the most productive ecosystems on earth. They maintain water quality through natural filtration as microbes break down organic matter and sediments bind pollutants. … Water draining from the land carries sediments nutrients and other pollutants.

Why estuaries is the most productive ecosystem?

Estuaries tend to be very rich in organisms. Rivers before they are diluted by the enormous body of ocean water have generally high concentrations of many chemical elements needed by plants and animals to build their tissues. Organic particulates draining from the land tend to be sedimented out in the estuary.

See also what does the u mean on food

Why are estuaries very productive ecosystems quizlet?

Estuaries are very productive ecosystems because they constantly receive fresh nutrients from the river. … the pollutants that damage estuaries are the same pollutants that damage other aquatic ecosystems: sewage industrial waste and agricultural run off.

What are the factors which affects productivity of ecosystem?

Net primary productivity varies among ecosystems and depends on many factors. These include solar energy input temperature and moisture levels carbon dioxide levels nutrient availability and community interactions (e.g. grazing by herbivores) 2.

What area of the ocean is generally most productive?

Although they occupy just fewer than two percent of the surface of the oceans the large coastal upwelling areas on the eastern edges of the Pacific and the Atlantic are among the most biologically productive marine areas of all.

What characteristics make ocean areas productive?

These include light availability oxygen levels water movement salinitydensity and pH. These conditions often vary from habitat to habitat and will either support or limit the life processes of the marine organisms living there.

What two main factors determine ocean productivity?

Abiotic factors like solar radiation and nutrients and biotic factors like zooplankton predation may affect ocean primary productivity. Productivity varies with the season and also locally and globally.

Where are oceans the most productive quizlet?

In the polar oceans phytoplankton blooms (explosive population growth) occur during the summer months as a result of favorable light conditions which lead to short-term increased primary productivity. During these months the Antarctic Ocean’s upwelling zone exhibits some of the Earth’s highest primary productivity.

Where in the ocean is plankton productivity the greatest Why?

Where in the ocean is plankton productivity the greatest? Why? Salt marshes and groves have the highest plankton productivity because of the vast amount of nutrients in the environment. There are more parasitic species of animals than all other sorts combined.

Which ecosystems are most productive?

The most productive ecosystems are fertile estuaries and marshes coral reefs terrestrial vegetation on moist alluvial deposits and intensive agriculture which can have productivities of 10-25 × 103 kcal/m2/yr.

Why are temperate oceans more productive than tropical oceans?

In the ocean the surface water gets very warm and remember that warm water is less dense than cold. This means the warm water in effect gets stuck above the cold water where all the nutrients are. … So the ocean is more productive in temperate zones. This also explains why the tropics have that pretty clear blue water.

How does productivity increase in aquatic ecosystems?

On land it is driven by temperature and availability of water and nutrients modified by land use. In aquatic ecosystems primary productivity is driven by the availability of nutrients and light and to a lesser extent by temperature and other factors.

Why Some ecosystems are more productive than others?

Why are some ecosystems or biomes more productive than others? Tropical rainforest: High productive rate because warm temp is ideal for photosynthesis and high global productivity. Open oceans: Low rates of production but ALOT of global productivity. … We depend on ecosystems for goods and services.

What makes a productive ecosystem?

‘Productive’ ecosystems are defined as those that support a large total amount of living matter from tiny microbes up to plants and animals. Scientists refer to this measurement of the amount of life present as an ecosystem’s ‘biomass’.

Is Deep Sea most productive ecosystem?

-Oceans contain lots of nutrients but they have no sufficient sunlight reaching in the deep areas therefore oceans have the least productivity among all ecosystems. … -The maximum productivity among all ecosystems is seen in the coral reefs followed by the estuaries. So the right answer is option C.

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