Differences Between Primary and Secondary Succession Primary succession is the development of living organisms into an area that wasn't previously colonized by anything living, usually these places have no soil and is barren land. Secondary succession is when there is a land already with soil, species, life, etc. but vegetation and species was removed by natural or human causes. Some examples could include forest fires, deforestation, and windstorms. | Soil in the tropical rainforest is actually very nutrient deprived. Despite what most people think, all the rain and millions of years of weathering makes the nutrients in the soil warn out and worse. The continuous rain washes nutrients out of the soil before it can really sink in. The only reason plant life is so abundent is because the plants store the nutrients in themselves and dont take it from the soil. When other plants die and decay then the living plants take their nutrients and use them for themselves. The topsoil of the rainforest is about 2 inches, while the whole layer of soil altogether is only about 3-4 inches. Clay lies underneath the soil and only around 20% can be used for agricultural purposes because its lack of nutrients.  |
Succession can keep stability in environments. In the tropical rainforest if there's an invasive species then secondary succession whipes out some of the species of animals and plants with natural causes and then years later the plants can grow back and the remaining animals can reproduce. This way successions can keep populations in check, this is why succession can be used as a stabilizer for my biome.
An example of secondary succession in the tropical rainforest is farmers in the rainforest cutting down trees to make room for growing crops, after several years of doing this the soil becomes infertile. Eventually once all of this is done then the farmers put fertilizers back into the soil and years later all the species of plants that were once there, grow back.
