QUIZ – 2020: INSIGHTS STATIC , 17 April 2021 – Environment

Solution: b)

Ecological succession, the process by which the structure of a biological community evolves over time. The time scale can be decades (for example, after a wildfire), or even millions of years after a mass extinction.

The community begins with relatively few pioneering plants and animals and develops through increasing complexity until it becomes stable or self-perpetuating as a climax community.

Two different types of succession—primary and secondary—have been distinguished.

• Primary succession occurs in essentially lifeless areas—regions in which the soil is incapable of sustaining life as a result of such factors as lava flows, newly formed sand dunes, or rocks left from a retreating glacier.
• Secondary succession occurs in areas where a community that previously existed has been removed; it is typified by smaller-scale disturbances that do not eliminate all life and nutrients from the environment.

Increased niche development is the characteristic feature of Ecological succession.

Solution: a)

A seral stage is an intermediate stage found in ecological succession in an ecosystem advancing towards its climax community. In many cases more than one seral stage evolves until climax conditions are attained.

Solution: c)

As per the Millennium Eco Assessment it is an index of the area of productive land and aquatic ecosystems required to produce the resources used and to assimilate the wastes produced by a defined population at a specified material standard of living, wherever on Earth that land may be located.

Ecological footprint analysis is widely used around the Earth in support of sustainability assessments.

It can be used to measure and manage the use of resources throughout the economy and explore the sustainability of individual lifestyles, goods and services, organizations, industry sectors, neighborhoods, cities, regions and nations.

Solution: b)

Dissolved oxygen (DO) is a measure of how much oxygen is dissolved in the water – the amount of oxygen available to living aquatic organisms. The amount of dissolved oxygen in a stream or lake can tell us a lot about its water quality.

Oxygen concentrations are much higher in air, which is about 21% oxygen, than in water, which is a tiny fraction of 1 percent oxygen.

Dissolved oxygen levels decrease with increasing temperature and atmospheric oxygen content is far higher than dissolved oxygen levels.

Ice and snow reduce the amount of sunlight reaching aquatic plants, thereby reducing photosynthesis and oxygen production.

Solution: b)

Keoladeo National Park formerly known as the Bharatpur Bird Sanctuary in Bharatpur, Rajasthan, is a famous avifauna sanctuary that hosts thousands of birds, especially during the winter season.

It is also a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

It is a man-made and man-managed wetland.

Due to its strategic location in the middle of Central Asian migratory flyway and presence of water, large congregations of ducks, geese, coots, pelicans and waders arrive in the winter.

The park was the only known wintering site of the central population of the Siberian Crane, and also serves as a wintering area for other globally threatened species such as the Greater Spotted Eagle and Imperial Eagle.