ECOLOGY
ENERGY FLOW AND PRIMARY PRODUCTION
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Question
[CLICK ON ANY CHOICE TO KNOW THE RIGHT ANSWER]
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shows the mass of living material in a food chain over time
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shows the mass of producers only
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does not change over seasons
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gives a ‘snapshot’ of the mass of living material in each trophic level
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Detailed explanation-1: -A biomass pyramid shows the efficiency of energy transfer at each trophic level. It can be upright or inverted. Marine ecosystems show inverted biomass pyramids.
Detailed explanation-2: -Another way to visualize ecosystem structure is with biomass pyramids. These pyramids represent the amount of energy that’s stored in living tissue at the different trophic levels. Unlike energy pyramids, biomass pyramids show how much biomass is present in a level, not the rate at which it’s added.
Detailed explanation-3: -In fact, only about ten per cent of the biomass is transferred from each trophic level to the next. The remaining 90 per cent is used by the trophic level to complete life processes . Biomass can be lost between stages because not all of the matter eaten by an organism is digested.
Detailed explanation-4: -Biomass decreases with each trophic level. There is always more biomass in lower trophic levels than in higher ones. Because biomass decreases with each trophic level, there are always more autotrophs than herbivores in a healthy food web.