Ecological niche
A niche is the set of conditions a species can persist in and the role it plays where it does: what it eats, what eats it, what temperature and moisture it tolerates, and what it competes with. The fundamental niche is the full range the species could occupy; the realised niche is the smaller range it actually occupies once competitors and predators are present. Two species with identical requirements cannot coexist indefinitely in the same place, so niches tend to diverge.
Why it matters
It is how ecology explains why a species lives where it lives, and it is the concept invasive-species and range-shift predictions are built on.
Also written: niche, niches
Where it comes up
Read about Ecological niche on Wikipedia
Sources
- Ecological niche Wikipedia
- Ecology Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
- Ecological Society of America Ecological Society of America
