Question

carrying capacity
the largest population an area can support with its resources (i.e. food, water, land) is called its carrying capacity. a population usually stays near its carrying capacity because of the limiting factors of a habitat.

as a population first begins to grow, it will typically exhibit exponential growth, and it will continue growing until the population overshoots the carrying capacity. the population will then run out of resources and decline rapidly until it can recover and stabilize around the carrying capacity. rabbit populations exhibited this behavior when they were first introduced into australia in the mid1800s. at first, their numbers increased rapidly because they had plenty of vegetation to eat and no predators. the rabbits quickly ate the land bare and their population crashed as they starved to death. however, over time, the vegetation recovered, and the rabbit population increased again.

the reintroduction of a predator, the lynx, has helped to stabilize the population so that its numbers remain relatively stable.

1. what is carrying capacity? (answer in a complete sentence by restating the question)

1. how are limiting factors related to carrying capacity? (answer in a complete sentence by restating the question)

1. label each of the blanks on the graph with the following stages of a population responding to the carrying capacity of the ecosystem with the following terms:
2. exponential growth 2) overshoot 3) decline 4) recovery 5) carrying capacity.

graph with population size vs time, and labels to fill, plus lynx and rabbit silhouettes

Explanation:

Question 12

To answer, we restate the question and use the definition from the text. The text says "The largest population an area can support with its resources (i.e. food, water, land) is called its carrying capacity." So we structure the answer to restate the question and include this definition.

We restate the question and use the relevant sentence from the text: "A population usually stays near its carrying capacity because of the limiting factors of a habitat." This shows the relationship between limiting factors and carrying capacity.

1. The first part of the graph (steep upward curve) is when the population is growing rapidly, so that's exponential growth (1).
2. The peak above the dashed line (carrying capacity) is when the population has exceeded the carrying capacity, so that's overshoot (2).
3. After the overshoot, the population drops quickly due to lack of resources, so that's decline (3).
4. Then the population starts to increase again as resources recover, so that's recovery (4).
5. The dashed line represents the carrying capacity (5), as it's the stable level the population fluctuates around.

(Note: Since the graph isn't fully visible, we assume the typical population - carrying capacity graph structure. The left - most upward slope is exponential growth, the peak above the dashed line is overshoot, the drop from the peak is decline, the upward slope after the low point is recovery, and the dashed line is carrying capacity.)

Answer:

Carrying capacity is the largest population an area can support with its resources (i.e., food, water, land).

Question 13