Habitat - the area of distribution of the taxon (family, genus, species)

Living organisms live on the globe everywhere: in land-air space, water environment, soil, and even in other living beings. Each species in nature lives in a certain environment, with which it directly interacts.

What is the habitat? In order to answer this question, we will consider broader concepts: community, biocenosis and biogeocenosis. Everyone knows that plants or animals that occupy homogeneous parts of the territory and interact with each other form communities. Those, in turn, are interconnected with all organisms that live in the given territory, forming a biocenosis. Interacting with factors of inanimate nature (temperature, humidity, lighting, etc.), organisms form a single complex with a cycle of substances and energy, which is commonly called biogeocenosis. Each species in the ecosystem feeds on certain food and is the base of nutrition for other organisms (food chain), and also survives in conditions - abiotic, biotic and anthropogenic - that are optimally suited to it. The habitat, which is the territory of the settlement of a specific taxon with clear boundaries, will also exist if there are suitable conditions. It is here that all the prerequisites for the prosperity of specific microorganisms, plants or animals are created.

The area is called continuous if the species lives on the entire area suitable for its habitat, or it occurs regularly in its specific places. Sometimes organisms can populate isolated areas on the boundary of a certain territory or water area, forming so-called island locations. If the habitat disintegrates into several uncoated plots in such a way that migration of animals and the exchange of seeds or spores in plants are not possible, it is called intermittent, or disjunctive.

A short Atomic, very small areas of habitat of ancient families, genera and species that used to occupy vast territories in the past, are called relict, for example, in ginkgo biloba or sem. Sapphire. Also, the habitat, depending on its size, can belong to so-called cosmopolitans, if it is extensive, and to endemics, if it is small.

Territories inhabited by certain species of plants and animals, because of active human intervention, suffer changes, sometimes leading to their complete destruction. However, after the death of representatives of the flora and fauna that lived in this area, it is populated by new representatives of the animal and plant life. For the study of settlement determine the boundaries. To do this, the map indicates the places where animals live or plants of a particular species grow, for example, a cheetah or Siberian fir. Such mapping helps to identify the location of plant and animal resources, the spread of pests of crops and forest lands, vectors of diseases, etc.

The question about what such a habitat can be answered is as follows: it is an area with clear boundaries, within which a definite taxon is distributed and passes the full cycle of its development. Organisms exist here due to the close relationship between environmental factors and other representatives of the flora and fauna.