AQUATIC ECOSYSTEM

An aquatic ecosystem is all that ecosystem that develops in a body of water of diverse size and nature, which includes seas, lakes, rivers, swamps, streams, lagoons and coasts. They play a vital role in the nature of water, its cycles, as well as the organic content present in it, both from natural and sedimentary sources (soils).

Aquatic ecosystems are broadly divided into maritime ecosystems (those belonging to the ocean and its coasts) and freshwater ecosystems (rivers, lakes, lagoons and streams), because according to the physical and chemical characteristics of each, they will have a different fauna and flora, adapted to the vital conditions as well as possible.

Characteristics of an aquatic ecosystem

The aquatic ecosystems are numerous and abundant in life, so they usually present complex trophic chains, of animals adapted to the specific conditions of the water: their salinity, their currents, etc. In the case of the rivers, much of it will depend on the terrestrial elements dragged or dissolved by the current, as well as the presence or absence of mineral or organic matter in the soils that it travels.

With the exception of amphibians and aquatic reptiles, many of which develop in the water but return to land to spawn (or vice versa), most of the animals in these ecosystems are adapted to permanent immersion in the water, so that depend on its biotic balance.