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Chapter 3
Living Resources
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| Natural Resource | anything in the environment that is used by people |
| Renewable Resource | are either always available or are naturally replaced in a relatively short time |
| Nonrenewable Resource | natural resources that are not replaced in a useful time frame |
| Pollution | the contamination of the Earth's land, water, or air |
| Environmental Science | the study of natural processes in the environment and how humans can affect them |
| Clear-cutting | the process of cutting down all of the trees in one area at once |
| Selective-cutting | cutting down only some trees in a forest and leaving a mix of tree sizes and species behind |
| Sustainable yield | an amount of a renewable recourse such as trees that can be harvested regularly without reducing the future supply |
| Fishery | an area with a large population of valuable ocean organisms |
| Aquaculture | the practice of raising fish and other water-dwelling organisms for food |
| Biodiversity | the number of different species in an area |
| Keystone Species | a species that influences the survival of many other species in an ecosystem |
| Genes | the structures in an organism's cells that carry its hereditary information |
| Extinction | the disappearance of all members of a species from Earth |
| Endangered Species | species in danger of becoming extinct in the near future |
| Threatened Species | species that could become endangered in the near future |
| Habitat Destruction | the loss of a natural habitat |
| Habitat Fragmentation | breaking larger habitats into smaller, isolated pieces, or fragments |
| Poaching | the illegal killing or removal of wildlife from their habitats |
| Captive Breeding | the mating of animals in zoos or wildlife preserves |
| Taxol | the substance that protects the Pacific yew tree |