Because the cycle of life has a very clear beginning and end, from birth to death, all living organisms exhibit very similar behaviors, that although very different according to the species, reflect the same needs to seek shelter, food and drink, and reproduce.
As the days grow longer and the sun warms the Northern Hemisphere, the sleepy and slow life, begins to awake from a very much needed regeneration period. The blood begins to thin out and some of the dormant instincts begin another cycle in the life of the organism.
Organism Taxonomy and Classification
There are millions of living organisms that are classified according to five kingdoms or groups of living things. The kingdoms all have in common that the organisms are made up of one or more cells, take in food, grow and reproduce or split to make new cells.
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- Kingdom monera
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- Kingdom protista
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- Kingdom fungi
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- Kingdom of plants
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- Animal kingdom
The greatest variety of organisms belongs to the family of arthropods. Arthropods have a hard skeleton called exoskeleton that covers their entire outside body. Insects are arthropods with the special characteristic of having six legs with a body composed of three distinct parts: head, thorax, and abdomen. The butterfly is an arthropod.
Sun = life
All forms of life need energy in order to grow. For this reason, all living organisms depend on some basic necessities such as the search for food. In every habitat there are food producers and food consumers. Plants and trees are the basic food producers through the conversion of the sun's energy into sugar with the help of water and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. This process of photosynthesis, and the oxygen that the plants give off in the exchange from solar energy to nutrients, is the basic tenant of life on earth.
Small herbivores feed on the plants and fruits. They are considered first consumers because they feed on food made by food-producing plants. These, in turn are the food consumers and producers to animals who depend on meat (carnivores) for energy. This dependence and interdependence of animals and plants as sources of energy creates a food chain. There can be food chains that are very simple such as a rabbit eating a plant or very complex ones that have many different levels and that depend on all of those levels being present. Humans, play a very important role in these chains.