14.9.2: Chapter Questions
- Page ID
- 50293
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- What are the four fundamental challenges that any species must meet to survive?
- What are the advantages and disadvantages of the benthic infaunal habitat in comparison with the benthic epifaunal and pelagic habitats? Describe how these factors change with depth and substrate type.
- How do suspension feeders obtain food, and why are there so many suspension feeders in the oceans?
- Why do most deposit feeders live in only the upper few tens of centimeters of the sediment?
- Why are some pelagic predators not able to swim fast? What other capabilities do they use to capture prey?
- Why do many fish species congregate in schools?
- What are the physical characteristics of a fish species that swims continuously at high speeds, and of a species that waits on the seafloor for prey to swim by?
- What are the three ways in which different fish species maintain their buoyancy? Which of these is more common in abyssal species, and why?
- For what reasons do many species migrate at some stage in their life cycles?
- What aspects of their environment might marine species be able to detect with senses other than sight?
Critical Thinking Questions
- Most marine species are adapted to eat only food of a certain type, such as suspended particles, organic coatings on sediment particles, phytoplankton cells of a certain size range, zooplankton, or small fishes. Discuss the possible reasons why most species do not develop (or do not retain) the ability to feed on many different types of food.
- Nudibranchs are snails that have no shell. They generally live on reefs and feed on algae, sponges, or corals. There are many holes in reefs that make excellent hiding places. Why do nudibranchs use poisons and bright coloration to warn off predators rather than just using the many available hiding places in the reef?
- Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of a spawning strategy in which large numbers of eggs and sperm are released simultaneously to the water column.
(a) Explain why you might expect this strategy to be more common in coral reef communities than in the polar regions.
(b) Are there any terrestrial species that employ a similar strategy? If so, what are they, and how does their strategy differ from the similar strategies of ocean species? - Describe the advantages and disadvantages that are experienced by species that live in association with other species.
(a) Explain why species associations are so common in the oceans.
(b) Do species live in associations in the terrestrial environment? If so, describe some of these associations.

