Competition: The Three Types Of Interactions Between Species

There are several interactions that happen between species. They include competition, mutualism, predation, parasitism, and disease. Each one of these can affect organisms either in a positive or negative way. These are all important for organisms to evolve and become the best fit of their species. Without these interactions species would never change and would die out very easily when faced with tough environments.

Competition is always over the supply of a limited resource. There are two types of competition: intraspecific and interspecific. Intraspecific is competition between the same species. This is usually beneficial to the species as a whole because it results in the best fit organism. Interspecific is competition between different species and is known to be detrimental to both species. There are three principles that apply to competition. Competition exclusion principle is when two species live together and occupy the same niche and eventually one species will out compete the other and replace it in that environment. The second principle is niche overlap which means that when two species live together over a large area one species will replace the other in part of that area. The last principle, character displacement, is when two species live together and initially occupy the same niche they may evolve to become different over time in order to avoid competition. When more than one species occupy the same niche and are very similar it is common for one of them to become specialized in that area. For example if two birds are eating the same food one may develop a different beak over time in order to hunt for a different food.

Mutualism is another important species interaction. Mutualism is a relationship that is benefi...

... middle of paper ...

... but similar areas. They put some in isolation and some went into a mixture of other species. It was discovered that the species in the mixture evolved more diversely than those that were in isolation. They also discovered that the mixture of species changed the way they used resources. This showed that the species that evolved together were more productive than the species in isolation. The final conclusion was that “species interactions can have a major effect on evolutionary dynamics, which can in turn influence ecosystems functioning” (Timothy G Barraclough).

I found the academic journals to be the most helpful. They provided a lot of information. Academic journals are the most reliable source when writing a paper because they are peer reviewed and are accurate in a specified field. All my articles stated the same information so there were no inconsistences.