Honors Biology Unit 3.2 Flashcards
(19 cards)
What are Trophic Levels?
The trophic level of an organism is the position it occupies in a food web. A food chain is a succession of organisms that eat other organisms and may, in turn, be eaten themselves. The trophic level of an organism is the number of steps it is from the start of the chain.
What is the level of an organism is the position it occupies in a food web. A food chain is a succession of organisms that eat other organisms and may, in turn, be eaten themselves.
Trophic Levels
What is a Autotroph?
An autotroph is an organism that produces complex organic compounds using carbon from simple substances such as carbon dioxide, generally using energy from light or inorganic chemical reactions.
What is an organism that produces complex organic compounds using carbon from simple substances such as carbon dioxide, generally using energy from light or inorganic chemical reactions?
Autotroph
What is a Heterotroph?
A heterotroph is an organism that cannot produce its own food, instead taking nutrition from other sources of organic carbon, mainly plant or animal matter.
What is an organism that cannot produce its own food, instead taking nutrition from other sources of organic carbon, mainly plant or animal matter?
Heterotroph
What is a Herbivore
A herbivore is an animal anatomically and physiologically adapted to eating plant material, for example foliage or marine algae, for the main component of its diet.
What is an animal anatomically and physiologically adapted to eating plant material, for example foliage or marine algae, for the main component of its diet?
Herbivore
What is a Omnivore?
An omnivore is an animal that has the ability to eat and survive on both plant and animal matter. Obtaining energy and nutrients from plant and animal matter, omnivores digest carbohydrates, protein, fat, and fiber, and metabolize the nutrients and energy of the sources absorbed.
What is an animal that has the ability to eat and survive on both plant and animal matter. Obtaining energy and nutrients from plant and animal matter, omnivores digest carbohydrates, protein, fat, and fiber, and metabolize the nutrients and energy of the sources absorbed?
Omnivore
What is a Carnivore?
A carnivore, or meat-eater, is an animal or plant whose food and energy requirements derive from animal tissues whether through hunting or scavenging.
What is an animal or plant whose food and energy requirements derive from animal tissues whether through hunting or scavenging?
Carnivore
What is a Detrivore?
Detritivores are heterotrophs that obtain nutrients by consuming detritus. There are many kinds of invertebrates, vertebrates, and plants that carry out coprophagy.
What are heterotrophs that obtain nutrients by consuming detritus. There are many kinds of invertebrates, vertebrates, and plants that carry out coprophagy?
Detrivore
Name similarities and differences between how matter and energy are transferred/transformed in an ecosystem
Energy flows straight through the ecosystem; it is lost as heat at each step, but it is never recycled. Matter is recycled and is not lost from the ecosystem.
What is the rule of 10 and how does it apply to ecological pyramid models?
The ten percent rule states that each trophic level can only give 10% of its energy to the next level. The other 90% is used to live, grow, reproduce and is lost to the environment as heat.
Why is it considered more efficient to eat at a lower trophic level vs. a higher trophic level?
Developing nations (as well as developed nations) could support more people or have a lower environmental impact if people ate at lower trophic levels.
Identify trophic levels of organisms in a food web
The first and lowest level contains the producers, green plants. The plants or their products are consumed by the second-level organisms—the herbivores, or plant eaters. At the third level, primary carnivores, or meat eaters, eat the herbivores; and at the fourth level, secondary carnivores eat the primary carnivores.
How do you read and making predictions using a trophic cascade model?
You predict that changes in density at one trophic level are caused by opposite changes in the next higher trophic level and that such inverse correlations cascade down a food chain.
