Analyze the food web in order to trace the flow of energy in the ecosytem shown?

Answer 1

You can analyze how much energy is consumed by an animal in the food web by the power of ten. It's really simple, actually. A fly has to get 100 grams of energy. It uses ninety for itself, and the other ten goes to the animal that consumes it. Say a spider eats that fly. The spider also needs 100 grams. So, if it gets ten grams from that one fly, it needs to eat nine other flies to reach its energy need for that day. And whatever eats the spider needs to eat nine other Spiders to reach its energy need. It continues like this for the whole web.

Answer 2

If you are given an image of a food chain focus on one producer (i.e. grass) then see which organism eats it. This would then be the primary consumer (the one on the second level of a trophic pyramid) (i.e. a mouse). Any organism on the second trophic level is either a herbivore (plant eater) or an omnivore (one that eats animals and plants). More commonly than not they are herbivores. The next organism that eats the mouse would be the secondary consumer; they tend to be either omnivores or carnivore's. They are on the third level of the trophic pyramid (i.e. a snake). In addition to listing the level on the trophic pyramid and what type of consumer each organism is, talk about the 10% rule. This rule states that only 10% of the energy from one organism is passed to the next. The rest of the energy is lost as heat.