Question

Question 3a Why would an organism not be found in every location across the landscape represented in a range map (hint: what landscape factors may make their distribution patchy)? Question 3 Why do geographic ranges need to include all life stages? (You can use one of the examples given, or choose another, in your explanation)

Answer 1

3a)

Distribution of organisms on a region is affected by both abiotic and biotic factors. Abiotic factors such as sunlight, soil, availability of water, humidity, salinity, temperature etc influences the distribution of organisms in a particular region. For example in a region of limited availability of water resources the organisms will be clustered around the available water resources.  Biotic factors include predation, diseases and intra and inter specific competition among organisms for food shelter etc.

3b)

Geographic range is a geographic boundary beyond which a species does not occur. Geographic range of a species will include all the life stages of that species because it is not possible to exist that species beyond that limit. Some organisms can,t survive beyond the limit.  There several factors influence the distribution of a species, which includes abiotic, biotic, genetic factors etc. Some physical barriers like mountain, ocean etc are also affect the geographical range of organisms.  For example, the wild cat Iriomote cat is only found in Japan's Iriomote island.