The Adaptive Life of Sharp Biology Diagrams Food Web: At each trophic level, there may be many more species than indicated in the table above.Food webs can be very complex. Food availability may vary seasonally or by time of day. An organism like a mouse might play two roles, eating insects on occasion (making it a secondary consumer), but also dining directly on plants (making it a primary consumer). A food chain shows how plants and animals get their energy. Here are some of the food chains in this food web: grass โ insect โ vole โ hawk. grass โ insect โ frog โ fox. FOOD CHAINS, FOOD WEBS AND ECOLOGICAL PYRAMIDS In an ecosystem, plants capture the sun's energy and use it to convert inorganic compounds into energy-rich organic compounds. This process of using the sun's energy to convert minerals (such as magnesium or nitrogen) in the soil into green leaves, or carrots, or strawberries, is called photosynthesis.
For example, in a simple forest food chain, trees and shrubs would act as producers. Rabbits and rodents would be primary consumers feeding on plants. Hawks would occupy the next tier up by preying on herbivores like rabbits. Higher-level consumers like bobcats or coyotes may hunt hawks, sitting above them in the food web. So while hawks are
T h e f ood c h a i n : w h o e a t s w h o i n t h e w i l d Biology Diagrams
Consumers found above the tertiary consumers in a food chain, or food web, are called quaternary consumers. They reside at the last trophic level in the food chain and have no natural predators. Thus, in most cases, they are the top predators, or apex predators, in the ecosystem. In the ecological pyramid shown, the hawk is the Quaternary Consumer.
Food Chain Example: Grass โ Grasshopper โ Frog โ Snake โ Hawk; Food Web Example: In a forest ecosystem, grasshoppers may be eaten by frogs, birds, and spiders, while snakes might consume frogs and birds, creating a more intricate energy transfer network. Parts of a Food Chain. Each food chain consists of several essential parts: The food chain is structured with green plants as producers, toads as primary consumers, snakes as secondary consumers, and hawks as tertiary consumers. Each step shows the transfer of energy from one organism to the next. The chain can be summarized as Green Plants โ Toad โ Snake โ Hawk. In some sense, hawks are at the top of the food chain. However, eagles are larger than hawks, so they occasionally go after smaller hawks and hawk nests. Do hawks eat snakes and lizards? Many hawks eat snakes and lizards. In some places, these small animals make up an important part of their diet. Red-tailed Hawks and Cooper's Hawks are some
