plant ecology : definition and branches of plant ecology

 Ecology: Definition

Ecology is a branch of biology which deals with the interacting system of organisms and their environment. The term ecology was introduced by H. Reiter in 1868, but it was properly defined by Ernst Haeckel, a German Biologist in 1869. The term ecology has been derived from Greek words Oikos meaning house and Logos meaning the study. Therefore, ecology is the study of organisms in their natural home or habitat.

Ecology is generally defined as the study of plants and animals in reciprocal relationship with their environment or external world.

Eugene P. Odum (1971) has defined ecology as ‘the study of structure and function of nature’ or simply ‘environmental biology’.

F. E. Clements, known for his extensive contributions to plant ecology, has regarded ecology as the ‘science of community’.

Branches of ecology

On the basis of study of organism individually or in group, ecology may be divided mainly in two branches, which are (1) autecology, and (2) synecology.

1.    Autecology-

Autecology is the study of individual species or its population including the effect of other organisms and environmental conditions on every stage of life cycle. This is also called as species ecology. The important aspects of autecological studies of an individual organism are – Physiology of the plant, Taxonomy and Nomenclature of the species, environmental complex (germination, flowering, and seed output reproduction capacity), Morphology of the plant etc.

2.      Synecology-

The study of the relationships of plants and animals making up a natural community is known as community ecology or synecology. Synecology is further subdivided into aquatic and terrestrial ecology.

(a).  The aquatic ecology includes marine ecology, freshwater ecology, and estuarine ecology.

(b). Terrestrial ecology includes grassland ecology, forest ecology, desert ecology and cropland ecology.

Many ecologists have divided ecology into a number of branches; some of them are as follows-

·       Paleoecology- It deals with organisms and their environment in the geological past.

·      Cyto-ecology- it deals with cytological details in species in relation to population in different environmental conditions.

·      Conservation ecology- it deals with application of ecological principles for a proper management of resources leading to high and sustained yield of useful biological materials for human welfare.

·      Ecosystem ecology- it deals with both plant and animal communities along with their total environment. In this both structure and function of the ecological systems are studied in relation to space and time. Special emphasis is laid on the flow of energy from the sun to green plants to animals and decomposers etc and the cycling of materials through the living system.