Ecology: Basics of Ecology | Definition | Ecology In India | Basic Concepts of Ecology
Basics of Ecology
Living organisms are present everywhere. They are found at every place. They complete their life cycle on snow covered mountain hills, riverbanks, deserts and even in hot water springs. Rarely there are a few places on the earth where living organisms are not found. But the species found in different places on earth are different, for e.g., animals found in water (fish) and plants growing in water cannot be found in near deserts. Similarly, the organisms living in hilly areas are different from the organisms of plains.
The distribution of organisms on the earth is not by their will. The difference between the organisms found in different places is mainly due to differences in their environmental conditions. Environment means all the factors which influence the organisms for e.g., light, climate, temperature, soil etc. The branch of science that deals with relationships between living organisms and their environment is known as ecology. It is comparatively a new science. It is related to those laws which decide the relationship between organisms and their environment.
 |
| Ecology |
In primitive society, every individual for survival needed to have some knowledge of his environment I.e., of the forces of nature and of the plants and animals around him. The writings of Hippocrates, Aristotle and other Greek philosophers contain material which may be considered of ecological nature. Theophrastus (370-285 BC) may well be regarded as the first ecologist in history because of the spoke of plant communities and the relation of the plants to each other and to their physical environment. Linnaeus (1707-1778) and Buffon in his book Natural History in 1756 made notable contributions to ecology.
Definition of Ecology
In 1859, GS. Hilaire used the term 'ethology' to refer to the study of relationships between organisms and the environment. Almost at the same time St. GS. Mivart gave the term hexicology for the study of the relationship between organisms and the environment. Later in 1868, the German zoologist, Reiter introduced the term oekologie, derived from the Greek words oikos (house) and logos (knowledge). E. Haeckel (1869) is often credited with the derivation of the term because he defined it in literature. The term has since been rendered in English form to Ecology. He also gave a precise definition of ecology as "the science treating of reciprocal relations of organisms and the external world". In 1895 Karl Mobius (1877) applied this idea to animals.
Warming (1895) employed it in the study of plants and defined ecology as the study of organisms in relation to their environment.
Fredric Clements defined ecology as the science of community.
Charles Elton (1927) defined ecology as the scientific natural history dealing with the sociology and economics of animals.
Woodbury (1955) defined ecology as a science which investigates organisms in relation to their environment, a philosophy in which the world of life is interpreted in terms of natural processes.
Tailor (1936) defined ecology as the science of all the relations of all organisms to all their environments.
Eugene Odum (1963) defined ecology as the study of structure and function of nature.
According to Indian ecologist R. Misra (1967) ecology is the study of interaction of form, function, and factors.
According to Kreb (1972), ecology is the scientific approach to the study of environmental interactions which control the welfare of living things, regulating their distribution, abundance, production, and evolution.
Ecology In India
In India, this science was started at the beginning of the 20th century Dudgeon (1921). Champion (1929), Bharucha (1940), Misra (1946) etc. were the pioneer ecologists of India. The first school of ecology in India was established in Mumbai (Institute of science, Mumbai) by Prof. FR. Bharucha (1930). Second school of ecology was established at Dept. of Botany, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi by Prof. R. Misra Keeping in view the role of biological productivity in human welfare, launching of IBP (International Biological Programme) by ICSU (International Council of Scientific Unions) made an important landmark in the development of ecology in India. MAB/UNESCO workshop on tropical deciduous forests and derived ecosystems was organized at Varanasi in 1975. Since 1950, a lot of work has been done on ecology. Now a days. this subject is included in all the syllabi of Higher Secondary schools, colleges at graduate and post graduate level and Indian Technical Institutes.
Basic Concepts of Ecology
1. Environment is usually a complex of several inter-related factors. It varies with time and space. It works as a sieve selecting organisms for growth from so many forms, and its one or the other factor becomes critical at critical stages of the life cycle of the species.
2. All living organisms and their environment are mutually reactive, affecting each other in various ways. Animal population, flora and vegetation are independent through the environment and are mutually reactive.
3. It is not only the environment which influences the life of organisms, but organisms too modify their environment because of their growth.
4. The species put each effort to maintain its uniformity. function, reproduction, growth, and development by preservation of its genetic pool. 5. Clements and Shelford (1939) put forth a concept of biome wherein all plants and animals are related to each other by their coaction and reaction on the environment.