Your environment is everything around you—nature, buildings, even your leftover snacks. The natural environment includes biotic (living) and abiotic (non-living) things, spread across four zones: lithosphere (land), hydrosphere (water), atmosphere (air), and biosphere (life). Then there’s the human environment, where people modify nature to suit their needs, from skyscrapers to farmland. Everything interacts in an ecosystem, where living things and their surroundings must stay balanced. Mess with nature too much, and well… nature fights back. Let us understand each topic in detail.
Components of Environment
- The environment includes all living and non-living things that exist on Earth.
- Biotic components are the living parts, such as plants, animals, and humans.
- Abiotic components are the non-living parts, such as land, water, and air.
- Together, biotic and abiotic components form the conditions that support life on Earth.
Natural Environment
- The natural environment consists of all living and non-living things naturally found on Earth.
- It is divided into four main domains that work together to sustain life.
- The lithosphere is the solid outer layer of Earth, made of rocks, minerals, and soil, with landforms like mountains and plains.
- The hydrosphere includes all water on Earth, such as rivers, lakes, seas, and oceans, essential for living organisms.
- The atmosphere is the layer of air around Earth, held by gravity, containing gases, dust, and water vapor to protect life.
- The biosphere is the zone where land, water, and air meet and interact to support plants, animals, and humans.
- The natural environment provides air to breathe, water to drink, food to eat, and land to live on.
What Is an Ecosystem?
- An ecosystem is a system where living organisms interact with each other and their surroundings.
- It involves relationships between plants, animals, and humans, as well as non-living elements like soil and water.
- Examples of ecosystems include large areas like rainforests, grasslands, deserts, and oceans.
- Smaller ecosystems, such as a pond or a park, also show how living and non-living things depend on each other.
- Ecosystems function through the transfer of energy and materials among all their parts.
Human Environment
- The human environment includes the activities, creations, and interactions of people.
- It consists of things humans make, such as buildings, roads, bridges, and industries.
- It also includes social systems like families, communities, schools, and economic activities.
- Early humans lived simply, adapting to nature by collecting food and using natural resources.
- Over time, humans learned to grow crops, domesticate animals, and build settlements.
- Inventions like the wheel, factories, and modern transport changed how humans use and modify nature.
- Human actions, such as building factories and driving cars, can harm the natural environment.
- Maintaining a balance between human needs and the natural environment is important for healthy living.
Questions and Answers
1. Answer the following questions.
(i) What is an ecosystem? An ecosystem is a system formed by the interaction of all living organisms with each other and with the physical and chemical factors of the environment in which they live, all linked by transfer of energy and material. It is also described as the relation between the living organisms, as well as the relation between the organisms and their surroundings.
(ii) What do you mean by natural environment? The natural environment refers to both biotic and abiotic conditions existing on the earth. It includes the world of living organisms (biotic) such as plants and animals, and the world of non-living elements (abiotic) such as land. The natural environment also encompasses the domains of lithosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere. It provides our basic life support system, including the air we breathe, the water we drink, the food we eat, and the land where we live.
(iii) Which are the major components of the environment? The major components of the environment are natural and human-made phenomena. The natural environment includes water (hydrosphere), air (atmosphere), land (lithosphere), and living things (biosphere). The human-made environment includes elements like parks, buildings, bridges, roads, industries, and monuments, as well as social, economic, and political situations.
(iv) Give four examples of human made environment. Four examples of the human-made environment from Figure 1.1 are parks, buildings, bridges, and roads. Other examples mentioned in the text include cars, clothes, books, mills, factories, and containers.
(v) What is lithosphere? Lithosphere is the solid crust or the hard top layer of the earth. It is made up of rocks and minerals and covered by a thin layer of soil. It is an irregular surface with various landforms such as mountains, plateaus, plains, valleys, etc., found over the continents and also on the ocean floors. The lithosphere provides us with forests, grasslands for grazing, land for agriculture and human settlements, and is a source of mineral wealth.
(vi) Which are the two major components of biotic environment? The biotic environment, or the world of living organisms, consists of the plant and animal kingdom.
(vii) What is biosphere? Biosphere or the living world is the zone of the earth where land, water and air interact with each other to support life. It encompasses the plant and animal kingdom.
2. Tick the correct answer.
(i) Which is not a natural ecosystem? (b) Aquarium. Deserts and forests are examples of natural ecosystems. Aquariums are human-made.
(ii) Which is not a component of human environment? (a) Land. Religion and community are listed as components of the human environment in Figure 1.1. Land is a part of the natural environment.
(iii) Which is a human made environment? (c) Road. Mountains and sea are components of the natural environment. Roads are made by people.
(iv) Which is a threat to environment? (b) Growing population. The teacher explains that our increasing needs, often driven by a growing population, lead to the modification and destruction of our natural surroundings. Growing plants and crops are generally beneficial for the environment.
3. Match the following.
(i) Biosphere – (e) narrow zone where land water and air interact (ii) Atmosphere – (a) blanket of air which surrounds the earth (iii) Hydrosphere – (b) domain of water (iv) Environment – (d) our surroundings
4. Give reasons.
(i) Man modifies his environment Man modifies his environment because of our needs that are increasing day by day. To fulfill these needs, human beings learn new ways to use and change the environment. For example, car fumes pollute the air, water is collected in a pot, food is served in vessels and land is used to build factories. Human beings also make cars, mills, factories and manufacture containers. Over time, humans learned to grow crops, domesticate animals, and engage in activities that further modified the environment, such as through the Industrial Revolution and advancements in transportation and communication.
(ii) Plants and animals depend on each other All plants, animals and human beings depend on their immediate surroundings. Often they are also interdependent on each other. This relationship between the living organisms, as well as the relation between the organisms and their surroundings forms an ecosystem. This implies that plants rely on animals for certain processes like pollination and seed dispersal, while animals depend on plants for food and shelter. The balance within an ecosystem highlights this interdependence.
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