ecology notes 2 biotic components

BIOTIC COMPONENTS

1st Law & Food webs

Eat or be eaten.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LU8DDYz68kM BuffaloEat and be eaten

Click on the link:

Autotroph / primary producer

Photosynthesis Chemosynthesis

PPP: A plant = producer = photosynthesisImage source: http://hartm242.wordpress.com/tag/chemosynthesis/

Makes own food (glucose) from primary energy source (sun or deep-sea thermal vents)

Heterotroph/ consumer

• Cannot make their own food • Must eat other living organisms

http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/mrshart/933775

Hetero (others) troph (nutrition)

Herbivore or primary consumer

palynivore (pollen)xylophage (wood)

Eat producers

Folivore (leaves)frigivore (fruit)granivore (seed)

mucivore (sap)nectivore (nectar)

Secondary consumers

Predator- hunting & eating

Eat consumer level below them

Carnivore = meat-eaters Omnivore = eat animals and plants

Prey- hunted & eaten

Quaternary consumers eat tertiary consumers (eagle eating a snake)

Top/ Apex predator

The top-end of the food chain

Humans often not considered natural enemies

Is not eaten by anything else(is not prey) because it has little/no natural enemies*

Detritivores• Eat detritus: plant and animal remains, shed parts

(skin, antlers, leaves), and wastes• Scavengers- detritivores that specialized in carrion

(dead animal bodies) or other animal wastes

Decomposers (aka saprotrophs)• gets its energy from non-living organic matter.• Help speed up the decaying process.

Cool fact: A gram of soil typically contains 40 million bacterial cells, and the bacteria on Earth form a biomass that exceeds that of all living plants and animals.

Fungi eat the dead matter by releasing acid to melt the decaying material, then sucking in all the acid, along with the melted material

Image source: sheppardsoftware.com

TROPHIC LEVELS

The difference between webs and chains

top predator