Ecology Notes 2 Section 1-2 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||
Food and Energy in the Environment | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Energy Roles: 1. Organisms may be producers, consumers, or decomposers 2. Producers make their own food and are able to use the sun to turn simple raw materials into food. 3. Producers are the source of all of the food in an ecosystem. 4. Consumers depend on producers for food and energy, they cannot make their own food. 5. An organism that feeds directly or indirectly on producers is called a consumer. 6. There are many kinds of consumers: a. Herbivores: Plant Eaters b. Carnivores: Meat Eaters c. Omnivores: Plant and Meat Eaters d. Scavenger: Feeds off bodies of dead animals 7. Decomposers break down dead organisms into simpler substances. 8. When things die, organisms called decomposers use the dead matter as food and in the process, they return important nutrients to the soil and water. 9. Decomposers are essential to the ecosystem because they rid the environment of the bodies of dead plants and animals. Food Chains and Food Webs: 1. The food and energy links amoung the producers and consumers in an ecosystem are represented by food chains and food webs. 2. A food chain represents a series of events in which food and energy are transfered from one organism in an ecosystem to another. 3. The first link in a food chain is a producer. The second link is a herbivore The third link and all the other links after are carnivores 4. Food chains give you a glimpse of the food and energy relationships in an ecosystem, however there must be more than one food chain in an ecosystem. 5. Having more than one food chain in an ecosystem is referred to as a food web, which is many overlapping food chains. Feeding Levels and Energy 1. A feeding level is the location of an organism along a food chain. 1st level: Producers 2nd level: Herbivores 3rd level: Carnivores 2. at each feeding level, organisms use the energy they obtain to digest their own food, reproduce, move, grow, and carry out other life activities. 3. The higher the feeding level, the less energy is available to them. End of Section 1-3 Notes! |
||||||||||||||||||||||||
1-2 Notes | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
1-3 Notes | ||||||||||||||||||||||||