Unit 2: Natural resources and ecosystem - Practice Quiz

1 What are natural resources?

2 Which of the following is a renewable resource?

3 Which of the following is a non-renewable resource?

4 What is soil erosion?

5 Which practice helps in preventing soil erosion?

6 What is the main cause of water pollution in rivers?

7 Which method is used to conserve water for future use?

8 What is deforestation?

9 Which activity is a remedial measure against deforestation?

10 Which of the following is an example of a fossil fuel?

11 Which of the following is a clean and renewable source of energy?

12 Which of the following is a way an individual can conserve electricity at home?

13 The 3Rs of resource conservation stand for:

14 Which of the following is an abiotic component of an ecosystem?

15 In an ecosystem, green plants are called:

16 Which of the following is an example of an aquatic ecosystem?

17 What is the primary source of energy for most ecosystems?

18 In a food chain, which organism is the primary consumer?

19 An ecological pyramid that shows the number of organisms at each trophic level is called a pyramid of:

20 Ecological succession refers to:

21 A power company is deciding between two fuel sources. Source X replenishes naturally within a human lifespan, while Source Y took millions of years to form and cannot be replaced once used. Which pair correctly classifies these sources?

22 Which of the following best describes why air, water, and soil are considered natural resources?

23 A farmer notices the topsoil of a sloped field washing away after every heavy rain, reducing crop yield. Which remedial measure would most directly address this problem?

24 In a coastal region, excessive pumping of groundwater has caused seawater to move inland into the aquifer, making well water salty. This problem is known as:

25 A hilly area experiences frequent landslides and reduced rainfall after large-scale tree felling. Which forest function was most likely lost, leading to these effects?

26 A village wants a clean energy source that is available every day and produces no greenhouse gases during operation. Which option best fits this requirement?

27 Which everyday individual action contributes most directly to water conservation at home?

28 In an ecosystem, which component is responsible for breaking down dead organic matter and recycling nutrients back into the soil?

29 According to the 10% law of energy transfer, if producers store kJ of energy, approximately how much energy is available to the secondary consumers?

30 In the food chain: Grass → Grasshopper → Frog → Snake, what would most likely happen to the grasshopper population if the frog population suddenly declined?

31 Which type of ecological pyramid is always upright regardless of the ecosystem, because energy is lost at each trophic level?

32 The gradual development of a community on a bare rock surface where no life existed before is best described as:

33 A student is asked to classify a pond, a lake, and a river. Under which broad category do all three belong?

34 A lake near farmland turns green with algae, and fish begin dying due to low oxygen. This condition, caused by nutrient runoff, is called:

35 Over-irrigation without proper drainage in an arid region has led to accumulation of salts on the soil surface, reducing fertility. This process is called:

36 Which of the following is a major environmental disadvantage of large hydroelectric dams despite generating renewable energy?

37 Why is a food web considered more stable than a single food chain?

38 In a grassland ecosystem, a single tree supports many insects, which in turn support fewer birds. Which pyramid of numbers pattern does the tree-based portion show?

39 Which sequence correctly lists the flow of energy through the biotic components of an ecosystem?

40 The final stable community that develops at the end of ecological succession and remains in equilibrium with the environment is called the:

41 A resource is classified as renewable only if its rate of natural regeneration () exceeds its rate of consumption (). Groundwater in a heavily pumped aquifer where is best described as:

42 Which of the following best distinguishes a potential resource from an actual (developed) resource?

43 In an area experiencing severe secondary salinization of irrigated soils, which combination of remedial measures targets the root cause rather than the symptom?

44 Two dam-building nations share a transboundary river. Upstream diversion reduces downstream flow, causing saltwater intrusion into a delta. This scenario most directly illustrates:

45 Clear-felling a tropical rainforest on a steep slope triggers a cascade of effects. Which sequence correctly orders the immediate to long-term consequences?

46 A solar PV plant has a nameplate capacity of and a capacity factor of . A coal plant of runs at a capacity factor of . What is the ratio of annual energy produced by the coal plant to the solar plant?

47 If gross primary productivity (GPP) of a grassland is and plant respiration consumes of GPP, what is the net primary productivity (NPP) available to primary consumers?

48 Which statement correctly explains why a pyramid of numbers can be inverted but a pyramid of energy can never be inverted?

49 In a food web, removal of a keystone predator leads to an explosion of a mid-level herbivore, which then overgrazes a foundation plant species. This chain of indirect effects is best termed:

50 A persistent lipophilic pesticide has a concentration of in water. Through four trophic levels each concentrating it , what is its concentration in the top predator?

51 Which scenario best represents primary succession as opposed to secondary succession?

52 In an ecosystem, decomposers are functionally critical because they:

53 Why do estuaries and coral reefs exhibit among the highest net primary productivities despite occupying a small fraction of Earth's surface?

54 Applying Lindeman's law, if producers fix , the maximum energy theoretically available to a tertiary consumer (4th trophic level) is:

55 From a life-cycle perspective, which individual action typically yields the greatest reduction in embodied resource consumption?

56 A lake receives high phosphorus loading from agricultural runoff. Which sequence correctly describes the resulting eutrophication process?

57 Contour bunding and terracing on hilly farmland primarily reduce soil erosion by:

58 Which statement best captures a key limitation shared by both solar and wind energy that necessitates grid-scale storage?

59 A pyramid of biomass in an ocean shows a smaller biomass of phytoplankton than of zooplankton at any instant. This apparent inversion is explained by:

60 During succession, which trend most reliably characterizes the transition from early pioneer stages to a mature climax community?