Ecosystems
What is an ecosystem?
living and nonliving things that interact with each other in an area
What does a food chain show?
How energy moves from one living thing to another as organisms eat each other.
Why do animals need to eat food?
To get energy
To move, grow, heal, think and keep warm.
Which two materials do plants mostly use to grow?
air and water
What might happen if one organism is removed from a food web?
Other organisms may lose a food source, causing changes throughout the food web.
Which of these living things is a decomposer?
A: ant eater
B: sun
C: plant
D: mushroom
D - mushroom
Where does the energy in food originally come from?
The Sun
Where do plants get the energy they need to grow from?
the sun/sunlight
What job do decomposers do in an ecosystem?
They break down dead plants and animals
Explain why an arrow can be drawn to a decomposer at any stage of the food chain.
Decomposers can break down any dead plant or animal. They get some of their energy from that dead material, so an arrow can be drawn to show energy flows to them.
Draw a complete food chain using two consumers
varies
What is a food web?
A system of many interconnected food chains in an ecosystem.
When a tree falls in a forest, mushrooms grow on its trunk. How does this help the forest ecosystem?
The mushrooms break down the dead tree and recycle its matter back into the soil.
In the food chain grass → rabbit → fox, what might happen if the rabbit population decreases?
The foxes may have less food, causing their population to decrease. The grass population may increase because fewer rabbits are eating it.
Which sentence about this food web is true?
A: Every path of matter through the web includes grasshoppers.
B.Every path of matter through the web ends with foxes or hawks.
C.Every path of matter through the web starts with foxes or hawks.
D.Both foxes and hawks eat birds and rabbits.
D
How does a producer get the energy it needs to grow?
Producers are plants that get energy by making their own food from the sunlight
From 1850 until the mid 1990s, a huge area of forest in California was cut down (logged) for timber.
What was the effect of the logging on the population of Californian Spotted Owls that lived in those forests?
The population of Spotted Owls in the areas of forest that were cut down would have dropped, because the owls' habitat was taken away.
Describe how energy from the Sun eventually reaches the fungi and bacteria.
Energy from the Sun is captured by the producer, which use it to make their own food. The producers are eaten by consumers so the energy passes along the food web. When any of these living things dies, the fungi and bacteria break it down and use some of the energy still stored in its body.
Describe how a plant uses matter and energy from its environment to grow.
How does a consumer get the energy it needs to grow?
Consumers are organisms/animals that get energy from eating another animal that ate a plant or from eating a plant