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B4F – Farming
•Intensive farming is when machinery and chemicals are used to produce as much food as possible
from land
•Battery farming involves keeping animals indoors and keeping movement restricted so they lose
less energy through heat
•Intensive farming improves energy transfer efficiency
◦Pesticides are used to improve biomass
◦Herbicides are used to reduce competition so crops gain more sunlight
◦Certain pesticides do not break down in the body and can kill
•Some farmers do intensive farming in glasshouses to protect the plants
•Some farmers use hydroponics – growing the plants in water or artificial soil
•Advantages of hydroponics
◦Control of mineral levels
◦Control disease by adding pesticides to the water, ensuring it gets to every plant
•Disadvantages of hydroponics
◦There is no deep soil for support
◦Fertiliser and minerals must be added to the water
•Organic Farming – Growing plants without artificial fertilisers, herbicides or pesticides
•Alternative methods
◦Animals manure and compost can be used as fertiliser
◦Nitrogen fixing crops can be grown
◦Crop rotation can be used so pests cannot build up in the said
◦Crops can be hand weeded
◦Farmers can vary seed planting times
◦This methods are more labour intensive
◦This is only successful if consumers are willing to pay more for their food
•Pest control
◦Using organisms to control pests is called biological control
▪Usually these are predators that eat the pests
▪An issue with this is that it may damage the food web and other animals may die out
▪Another issue is that the control organisms may become pests themselves
B4G – Decay
•Plants and animals are made from organic material, when this breaks down, it is called decay
•Organisms that break down dead organic material are called decomposers
•They allow chemical elements to be recycled
•The two main groups of decomposers are bacteria and fungi
◦They release enzymes to partially digest the chemicals and then take them up
◦This feeding is called saprophytic nutrition
◦The bacteria and fungi are called saprophytes
•Another group are animals that feed on pieces of dead and decaying material
◦These pieces are called detritus
◦The animals are called detritivores
◦Detritivores increase decay by breaking up material so it has a greater surface area
•Rate of Decay is increased when there is
◦High oxygen levels for the microbes to respire
◦Water for substances to dissolve and for the chemical reactions of respirations to occur
◦Micro-organisms to break down the material
◦Warm temperature to keep respiration and growth of the microbes optimised
•Food preservation is preventing food from decay
◦Canning – food is heated to boiling point and then canned, this kills micro-organisms and prevents
water and oxygen entering
◦Cooling – Food is kept in refrigerators which slows down the growth and respiration of micro-
organisms
◦Drying – Dry air is past over the food, preventing respiration of the micro-organisms
◦Freezing – Food is keep well below freezing so micro-organisms cannot respire or reproduce
because chemical reactions are slowed
◦Adding salt or sugar – this draws water away from the micro-organisms
◦Adding Vinegar – Prevents the enzymes from working because the vinegar is to acidic
◦Food can have chemicals added
▪People claim they taste funny or have side-effects
B4H – Recycling
•Recycling chemicals is important for us to gain carbon, nitrogen and oxygen as well as other
elements
•Fritz Haber invented a process to combine nitrogen with hydrogen to make ammonia, a fertiliser
•Carbon is the base for all living organisms
•The main source of carbon is carbon dioxide in the air and it enters living organisms when plants
photosynthesis
•Carbon can be found in the bottom of the sea
◦Some animals make their shells out of carbonates
◦This is compressed into limestone rock
◦It can be worn away by weathering and joins the carbon cycle
•The Carbon cycle
◦Animals release carbon dioxide in respirations
◦Plants use it in photosynthesis
◦Animals receive it through feeding
◦Animals die and their carbon dioxide is released by decomposers
◦Animal remains are burned for fuel and carbon dioxide is released
•The air is 78% nitrogen
•The Nitrogen cycle
◦Plants absorb nitrates through their roots
◦This is transferred in feeding
◦When animals die, their nitrogen is transferred by decomposers in to ammonium compounds
◦Nitrifying bacteria oxidise the compounds into nitrates
◦Some nitrogen is returned to the air by denitrifying bacteria
◦Some nitrogen from the air is changed to nitrates by nitrogen fixing bacteria