Q.What are ecological equivalents? Give one example.

Habitat and niche are frequently confused but describe genuinely different things. A habitat is the specific physical place — the actual address — where an organism lives, defined by a particular combination of abiotic conditions; the environment of an entire community is called a biotope. A niche is not a place at all but a functional role — everything an organism does for a living within its ecosystem (what it eats, what eats it, how it reproduces, what it competes for). The habitat-plus-niche of an organism together is called its ecotope. Practically: many different species can share the same habitat, but a single niche is typically occupied by only one species at a time, since two species competing for the identical role tend to end in one excluding the other; organisms usually show strong habitat fidelity, but the same organism may shift its niche with time or season. A closely related idea is ec …