How is a food chain related to energy flow within an ecosystem?
1 Answer
A food chain is a linear way of detailing what eats what essentially. For example, a carnivore consumes a herbivore, that herbivore consumed some sort of green plant, and that green plant used light as an energy source. The green plant would be called a primary producer and that herbivore a primary consumer. The carnivore that consumed the primary consumer would be called a secondary consumer. Decomposers, for example bacteria and fungi, break down dead organisms and return that energy to the environment.
)
Through each of these stages, energy is lost to the environment. The carnivore does not obtain 100% of the energy available from the herbivore. A significant portion of energy is lost.
)
Ecosystems are communities of living organisms. Thus, within an ecosystem there will be many food chains, and energy will constantly be moving from one form to another.
Here's a link to learn more about energy and food chains.
Detailed, with good pictures on this page: https://www.boundless.com/biology/textbooks/boundless-biology-textbook/ecosystems-46/ecology-of-ecosystems-256/food-chains-and-food-webs-948-12208/
