food web articles
How is the passage of energy through living components characterized?
What process do producers use to convert radiant energy into stored chemical energy?
What term describes the energy available to the next trophic level after producers account for their own energy needs?
What specific role do primary consumers fulfill in a food chain?
What is the primary advantage of modeling energy flow using a food web over a simple food chain?
For what reason is a significant portion of consumed energy lost between trophic levels?
According to the Rule of Ten, what percentage of energy from one trophic level is successfully incorporated into the biomass of the organisms at the next level?
What characteristic explains why food webs rarely have more than four or five trophic levels?
What is the major ecological contribution of decomposers regarding matter?
What shape does the biomass pyramid take due to the inefficiency of energy transfer?
What distinguishes the effect of a trophic cascade from simple predator-prey dynamics?
What is the primary cause initiating a classic trophic cascade?
In the Yellowstone example, what was the direct result of wolf reintroduction on vegetation?
How do bottom-up controls, like nutrient availability, relate to the scale of a trophic cascade?
What key observation suggests scientists are witnessing a trophic cascade rather than simple dynamics?
In marine ecosystems, what happens when the sea star Pisaster ochraceus is removed?
Which scenario describes the removal of strong top-down control that triggers a cascade?
What characterizes the role of secondary or tertiary consumers in ecosystem structure?
Why might a trophic cascade linked to large terrestrial mammals manifest over decades?