Ecosystem

Food chain and energy flow

 Survival
• All living organisms depend upon their
environment for three ‘survival essentials’.
• These are a supply of food, shelter from
physical conditions and a breeding site
• The organisms interact with their
environment:
CO2, H2O, light, soil….
 Ecological terms
means all the conditions that surround
any living organism - both the other
environment
living things and the non-living things
or physical surroundings
means a place where plants and animals
a habitat
live (eg a pond)
means all the members of a single
a population species that live in a habitat (eg
minnows)
a community of means all the populations of different
living things organisms living together in a habitat
refers to a community of animals, plants
an ecosystem and micro-organisms, together with
the habitat where they live
This pond ecosystem consists of a pond habitat, inhabited by
populations of aquatic plants, waterside plants, micro-
organisms (in the mud at the bottom of the pond), minnows
and herons. The organisms together make up a community
of living things.
Biomes (生物社會): major world communities of
plant and animal life
 Abiotic factors
• Temperature :high temp will denature
enzymes while low temp will inactivate them
(most organisms can only survive within a
narrow range of temperatures (10-40℃)
Homoiotherms, poikiolotherms
• Light (light intensity and amount of
particles suspended; duration – day
length); effects on animals
 Abiotic factors
• Water (rainfall and humidity)
• It is an essential component of protoplasm.
• Organisms can survive when the water supply
can replace for the loss.
• Water supply for land organisms depends on
rainfall while their water loss is strongly affected
by the humidity of the air.
 Abiotic factors
• Substratum
• The surface on which organisms live.
• Soil, mud, stones, rocks
• The nature (pH, salinity, texture)affects the
organisms living there.
 Abiotic factors
• Wind
• Affects the humidity of air that in turn affects
the rate of transpiration (evaporation)
 Features of ecosystems
Energy transfer
• To keep the ecosystem working
• Ultimate source of energy – SUN
• Photosynthesis
• Feeding relationship
 Features of ecosystems
Recycling of matter
• Photosynthesis, respiration, feeding, excretion,
death, decay
• Matter can be recycled for use

Interdependence of organisms
• Interaction between living organisms

Mutual influence between abiotic and biotic

factors
 Biotic factors are the effect of all the living things in
the environment - for example:
• which producers (green plants) are present
• which consumers and predators are present
• the number and type of competitors for light, food,
space, shelter, or mating opportunities
• the pathogens and parasites which are present
• the number and type of insect species present
• the number and type of decomposers, and
• the level of species diversity
 Biotic components
• Producers - autotrophs
• Consumers – primary, secondary, tertiary
• Decomposers – saprophytic bacteria and fungi
 Experiment to set up a balanced aquarium

Ecosphere

Balanced aquarium

Nutrients cycling in a balanced aquarium

 Result and interpretation
• If the aquatic plants and animals remain healthy, the
aquarium is balanced.
• A balanced aquarium is a balanced ecosystem in which
the community (such as the aquatic plants, snails and the
micro-organisms) interact with the abiotic factors (O2,
CO2, H2O & mineral salts) to form a self-supporting
system.
• Now the life processes (respiration, photosynthesis,
feeding & decay of the living organisms cause the
materials to be used con’t in a cyclic form.
• A con’t supply of energy from the sun is needed coz the
energy lost from the ecosystem can’t be recycled.
An oak tree ecosystem

Example of an ecosystem
oak tree ecosystem

oak tree ecosystem

Adaptation
The competition between organisms means that those who
are best adapted are most likely to survive and reproduce.
Natural selection means that over many generations
organisms become progressively better adapted to their
environment
sheds water after swimming

鯨脂

large feet to spread the load on snow

and ice, better than high-heeled
shoes
 Interactions between biotic
components
• Symbiosis – interactive relationship
between two or more different organisms
that live together
• Saprophytism – interaction of organisms
with dead organic matters
• Predator-prey interaction – the hunting of an
organism on another organism
 Symbiosis
• Commensalism (+,0) – relationship between
two species of organisms, in which one (the
commensal) benefits and the other one (the
host) not affected
• Mutualism (+,+) - relationship between two
species of organisms, in which both benefit
• Parasitism (+,-) - relationship between two
species of organisms, in which one benefits but
the other one is harmed
 Energy flow
• Is represented by
• Food chain
• Food web
• Pyramid of number
• Pyramid of biomass
 Feeding relationships
1. Predators: kill for food. They are either
secondary or tertiary consumers
2. Prey: are the organisms that predators feed on.
3. Scavengers: feed on dead animals . They
perform a useful cleaning-up function. Examples
are crow, vulture
4. Decomposer: feed on dead and decaying
organisms and on the undigested parts of plant
and animal matter in the faeces. Eg) bacteria and
fungi
 Food chain
• During feeding, one organism is obtaining
food – energy and raw materials – from
another one.
• Usu. one organism eats another, but then
may itself be food for a third species.
• The arrows indicate the direction in which
the energy flows.
 Some simple food chains
Habitats Producers Primary Secondary Tertiary
consumers consumers consumers
Grassland Grass Grasshopper lizard Snake
Green Tree
Woodland Caterpillar Merlin
plant sparrow
Freshwater Green Mosquito
Protozoa Fish
pond algae larva
Rocky
Sea weed Bivalve Starfish Sea bird
shore
1.The organisms tend to get bigger moving along the food
chain: WHY?
2. Energy is lost as heat on moving from one trophic level to the next, so
an animal to the right of a food chain needs to eat several organisms
‘below’ it in order to obtain enough enery.
Food web for a grassland community
A food web of a freshwater pond community
A food web of a marine community
 Trophic levels
• Each feeding level in a food chain or food web is
called a trophic level
• Producers form 1st trophic level
• Herbivores form 2nd trophic level
• Carnivores form 3rd trophic level

• Energy is transferred from the lower trophic

levels to the upper ones.
 Energy transfer
• The amount of energy that is passed on in a food
chain is reduced at every step.
• Since energy can be neither created nor
destroyed, it is not “lost” but is converted into
some other form.
respiration :
 Ways of energy ‘loss’
• In the flow of energy through the ecosystem, only
about 10% of the energy are retained in each
trophic level. The majority of energy is lost in 3
main ways:
• Uneaten organisms:
• Unabsorbed food and excretory wastes:
• Respiration:
 Number of trophic levels
• Due to the great loss of energy of energy along the
food chain, food chain rarely consists of more than
five trophic levels
• Short food chain can support more top consumers
than long ones coz with less trophic levels, less
energy is lost.
– Food chain I: beans man
– Food chain II: grass cows man
• Food chain I provides more protein food to man coz of less
energy loss. Therefore, it is more economical to grow crops
rather than rearing livestocks.
 <1% of the energy
released from the Sun
falls onto leaves.

Energy
‘fixed’ by
producers is
only 5-8% of
the energy
that falls
onto their
leaves:
Some is transmitted
(passes right through)
Some is reflected
Some is not the
correct wavelength
 <1% of the energy
released from the Sun
falls onto leaves.

Energy
‘fixed’ by
producers is
only 5-8% of
the energy
that falls
onto their
leaves: Energy transfer to
primary consumer: 5-
Some is transmitted 10%:
(passes right through) Much of plant body is
Some is reflected indigestible
Some is not the Consumer rarely eats
correct wavelength whole plant – roots or
stems may be left
behind
 <1% of the energy
released from the Sun
falls onto leaves.

Energy
‘fixed’ by
producers is
only 5-8% of
the energy
that falls
onto their
leaves:
Energy transfer to
secondary consumer:
10-20%:
Animal material has a
higher energy value &
is more digestible
 <1% of the energy Repiration losses occur from each trophic
released from the Sun level. Each organism uses some of the food
falls onto leaves. compounds it has synthesised or obtained as
food to release energy to drive metabolic
reactions. Respiration is not 100% efficient
and eventually all of this energy is lost as heat.

Energy transfer to decomposers is very

variable, but eventually the entire energy
content of the animal and plant remains
will be released as heat from inefficient
respiration.
Note that energy flow is not cyclic:
Sunlight ➔ chemical bond energy ➔ heat
As a result there must be a continuous input of light
energy to ‘thrive’ life in an ecosystem.
Which one?
 Ecological pyramids
• Pyramid of number:
• the number of organisms at each trophic level is
represented proportionally be a block in a diagram
• Due to the loss of energy at each trophic level less
energy is available to support the organisms higher
up the food chain.
• The size of the organisms affects the shape of
the pyramid of number

If the producer is very big such as a tree, it will

support hundreds of insects which in turn will
support tens of birds. Their feeding relationship
produces an atypical pyramid of number.
2. In a parasitic food chain, the insects may support
thousands of parasites inside their bodies. These
feeding relationships produce an inverted pyramid of
number.
 Pyramid of biomass
• The amount of energy is an organism depends
on the total amount of living material (biomass)
in the body.
• Biomass is the total mass of an organism without
water.
• As there will be energy loss in each trophic
level, there will be a decrease in the biomass of
each trophic level up the food chain in the
pyramid of biomass.
• The biomass of each trophic level is represented
proportionally by a block in a diagram