Food chain basics

1. What did you learn in the video?
Which way should arrows always
point?
Which organism is always at the
bottom of a food chain or web?
What is another name for producer
and consumer?
Did you pick up on the names of the
trophic levels?

2. Ultimately all energy comes
from…
Where does the Earth’s energy come
from?
Sun
Only a tiny fraction is used by plants
in photosynthesis…1%
Everyone else gets 10% of the energy
from the level below them.

3. Draw a food chain using hawk,
grasshopper, clover plant and rat.
Label the trophic levels.

4. “Rule of 10”
Rule of 10 says that only 10% of the
energy available in the lower trophic
level goes to the next level.
If there is 100 kcal of energy available
to the clover plant…how many kcal
are available to the other levels?
Label the amount of energy passed to
each trophic level on your chain.

5. 100 kcal
10 kcal
1 kcal
0.1 kcal
producer
Primary consumer
Secondary consumer
Tertiary consumer

6. Go to p.114 in bio textbook and define
the following terms in your notebook:
Autotrophs
Photosynthesis
Chemosynthesis
Heterotrophs
Phytoplankton
Food chain
Food web
Trophic level
biomass
After you define
the terms, create
a food chain using
the following
organisms:
Phytoplankton
Bass
Blue gill
Zooplankton

7. Make the following food chain in
your notebook:
You may need to look up a few terms
to do it correctly.
Phytoplankton
Blue gill
Bass
Zooplankton
Crocodile

8. Create a pyramid of energy for your
food chain you just created.
If there is 1000 KJ (kilojoules) of
energy available to your
phytoplankton, determine the amount
of energy available to each trophic
level and draw a pyramid of energy
for your food chain.

9. Biomass pyramid
Biomass is the total mass of a group of organisms in
an area

10. Why do higher trophic levels contain
fewer individuals?
W/ the high reduction of energy as it
moves up the chain, less is left to
support higher-order consumers.

11. Include this in your notebook:
Where does the Earth’s energy come
from?
Draw a food chain with your handouts
and five organisms. Label the trophic
levels. Label the amount of energy
available at each level. The amount of
energy available to the producers is
1,000 kJ.
Draw a biomass pyramid for this food
chain.
What does a Marsh or wetland look like?

12. Marsh or Wetland: