Energy flow

Energy flow through an ecosystem begins with the?

Sun

What does a food chain start with?

Producer

What does a typical food chain look like?

Producer → primary consumer (herbivore) → secondary consumer (carnivore/omnivore) → tertiary consumers → quaternary consumers

Food chains consists of

different tropic levels → position that an organism occupies in a food chain/web (what it eats, and what eats it)

(relates to producer, primary consumer etc etc)

Food web is?

A combination of food chains that integrate to form a network

(some organisms can feed off each other e.g. bird eats mosquito, mosquito feeds on birds)

What happens if a food web is more complex?

Ecosystem will be more stable since a shift in any organism population numbers would not adversely affect the other organisms in the ecosystem.

What are some factors that can affect ecosystems that can affect populations and communities or habitats?

Disease outbreaks

Introduction of new animals and plants into the habitat

Human activities (deforestation and overfishing)

Ultimately, all life forms from all trophic levels would?

all trophic levels will be decomposed by decomposers

Why is this important?

If not the plants will not get essential nutrients, and dead matter and waste would pile up.

How is energy lost?

Loss is through conversion into other forms of energy, such as heat, sound, and processes such as respiration, inefficient or wasteful digestion, movement, reproduction etc

What does this mean?

Energy must be added to keep it going otherwise the energy will be lost

On average, how much energy is transferred?

10% of the energy is captured and used by the organism in the next trophic level.

What does this mean?

This means the transfer of energy between trophic levels is not 100% efficient.

Flow of energy is non-cyclic in nature which means energy at the top will not move back down the trophic levels or jump down to the producers.

What types of ecological pyramids are there?

Pyramid of numbers (population)

Pyramid of biomass

Pyramid of energy

Why would some pyramids be inverted?

Only number pyramids will be inverted. E.g. tree → insects. As one tree is very big, we do not need a lot of trees to support insects.

What is ecological balance?

Condition of dynamic balance within an ecosystem in which the SPECIES AND DIVERSITY REMAIN IN A STABLE STATE.

why is it important?

Ensure continued survival of organisms.