Definition of Food Chains and Types of Food Chains along with Complete Examples
The food chain is the process of eating and being eaten – in a series of organisms – in a certain order. Every living thing needs an energy to live. Living things get energy from the food they eat, and all living things get energy from food. On this occasion, we will review the complete food chain here. Therefore, let’s look at the reviews below.
Definition of Food Chain:
A food chain is an event of eating and being eaten between fellow living things in certain sequences. In a food chain there are living things that have roles as producers, consumers, and as decomposers (decomposers). In the event of a food chain, there is a process of eating and being eaten in a certain order. And each level of the food chain in an ecosystem is also called a trophic level.
At the first trophic level, an organism that can produce or make its own food substances, namely green plants, can also be referred to as producers. Then the organisms that rank in the second trophic level are primary consumers (level I consumers), these consumers are generally occupied by herbivorous animals (plant eaters).
Furthermore, organisms that occupy the order of the third trophic level are also called secondary consumers (level II consumers), generally occupied by carnivorous animals (meat-eating animals) and so on. And organisms that occupy the highest or last trophic level are also called top consumers, usually omnivorous animals.
Food chain in the rice field
One form of a reciprocal relationship between living things is the ” Food Chain “. The food chain is the process of eating and being eaten – in a series of organisms – in a certain order. Each group of organisms is involved in the process of eating or being eaten.
This process occurs sequentially. Some groups of organisms prey on other groups of organisms. And these predatory organisms also become prey for other groups of organisms. Consider the following food chain example.
Plants as autotrophs produce food in the form of flower nectar. Butterflies as plant-eaters consume flower nectar. Frogs catch butterflies to eat. Snakes hunt frogs for food and eagles eat snakes.
The food chain picture above is an example of a food chain that occurs in a rice field community. You can look for examples of food chains in other communities.
The food chain is the entry point for the flow of energy for living things. The energy comes from the sun which is converted by autotrophic organisms (food makers) such as plants into chemical energy (in stems, fruits, leaves, etc.). Meanwhile, heterotrophs (unable to make their own food) obtain energy by eating autotrophs.
Types of Food Chain
Based on the organism that started it, the food chain is divided into several types. grazing chains, detritus chains, parasitic chains, and saprophytic chains. Here are the differences between each type.
1. Grazing food chain
This food chain is the most frequently encountered and recognized. This food chain starts from plants as producers at the first trophic level. An example of this one food chain cycle is: grass ==> grasshoppers ==> birds ==> snakes.
Other Examples: In the picture above, it is known that autotrophic grass acts as a producer, then it is eaten by grasshoppers, then grasshoppers are eaten by lizards and finally lizards are eaten by eagles.
In figure (c), grass as a producer is eaten by grasshoppers as the first consumer, grasshoppers are eaten by frogs as the second consumer, frogs are eaten by snakes as the third consumer, and snakes are eaten by eagles as the fourth consumer. Furthermore, if the eagle dies, then the carcass will be eaten by other organisms and decomposed by decomposing bacteria.
2. Detritus food chain
This food chain does not start from a plant, but starts from detritivores. Detritivores are heterotrophic organisms that obtain energy by eating the remains of living things.
An example of a detritus food chain cycle is: leaf debris (garbage) ==> earthworms ==> chickens ==> humans.
Detritus is a fragment (destroyed) of dead organisms (animals and plants) and the remains of organisms such as: animal waste, leaves, fallen twigs that are decomposed by decomposers. Then which includes detritus-eating organisms called detritivores, for example worms, termites, keluwing and so on.
The flow of the detritus food chain can be seen in the following figure: Figure 2. An example of a detritus food chain.
In the picture above, it is known that detritus can be in the form of crushed animal or plant tissue. In figure (a), detritus in the form of animal tissue is eaten by caterpillars and then rats, snakes and birds. But in the end, all these organisms can become detritus as well. While in picture (b), detritus in the form of crushed plants is eaten by woodlice which is then eaten by birds.
3. Parasite food chain
A parasite is a term for organisms that live by harming other organisms (hosts). The hallmark of this type of food chain is that there are small organisms that prey on large organisms.
Consider the following example of a parasitic food chain. buffalo (blood) -> ticks ==> starlings ==> eagles
4. Saprophyte food chain
The characteristics of the saprophyte chain start from the decomposition of the dead bodies of living things by saprophytic organisms. Examples of saprophytic organisms are bacteria, fungi, and lichens. Saprophyte is a term for organisms that are able to break down the remains of organisms that have died.
Saprophytic organisms are different from detritivores. Saprophytes break down organic matter left over from dead bodies into inorganic materials (minerals) which are reabsorbed by plants. Consider the following example of a saprophyte food chain. Weathered wood -> mushrooms -> chicken -> fox
Food web
An ecosystem generally not only consists of one food chain but many food chains. Green plants are not only eaten by one organism but can be eaten by various primary consumers. For example: hibiscus leaves are eaten by caterpillars, caterpillars also eat mustard leaves. Mustard leaves are also eaten by grasshoppers, grasshoppers are eaten by frogs and sparrows, sparrows also eat caterpillars, sparrows are eaten by eagles.
Mustard leaves are also eaten by rats, rats are eaten by eagles. As a result, in an ecosystem, there is not only one food chain but many forms of food chains. Food chains that are interconnected with one another are called food webs.
Ecological Pyramid
An ecological pyramid is a pyramid diagram that can describe the relationship between one trophic level with another trophic level, quantitatively in an ecosystem. In this pyramid, the organisms that occupy the lower trophic level are relatively numerous. The higher the trophic level, the fewer the number of individuals. The trophic level consists of producers, primary consumers, secondary consumers, and tertiary consumers.
Producers always occupy the first or lowest trophic level. While herbivores or primary consumers occupy the second trophic level, secondary consumers occupy the third trophic level, tertiary consumers occupy the fourth trophic level or the top of the pyramid.
Types of Ecological Pyramids
1. Energy Pyramid
The energy pyramid is a pyramid that depicts the loss of energy in the transfer of food energy at each trophic level in an ecosystem. In the energy pyramid not only the total amount of energy used by organisms at each trophic level of the food chain but also involves the role of various organisms in energy transfer.
In the use of energy, the higher the trophic level, the more efficient it is used. However, the heat released in the energy transfer process becomes greater. Heat loss in the respiration process also increases from organisms with low trophic levels to organisms with higher trophic levels.
As for productivity, getting to the top of the trophic level is getting less and less, so that less energy is stored as well. Energy in the energy pyramid is expressed in calories per unit area per unit time.
2. Biomass Pyramid
The biomass pyramid is a pyramid that depicts the reduced energy transfer at each trophic level in an ecosystem. In the biomass pyramid, each trophic level shows the dry weight of all organisms at the trophic level expressed in grams/m2. Generally, the pyramidal shape of the biomass will decrease towards the top, because the transfer of energy between trophic levels is not efficient. But the pyramid of biomass can be inverted.
For example, in the open ocean the producers are microscopic phytoplankton, while the consumers are microscopic creatures to large creatures such as blue whales where the blue whale’s biomass exceeds the producers. The top of the pyramid of biomass has the lowest biomass, which means the number of individuals is small, and generally carnivorous individuals at the top of the pyramid are large.
3. Pyramid of Numbers
That is a pyramid that describes the number of individuals at each trophic level in an ecosystem. Pyramids of numbers generally narrow upwards.
The pyramid of organisms from the lowest trophic level to the top is the same as the other pyramids, namely producers, primary and secondary consumers, and tertiary consumers. This means that the number of plants in the first trophic level is more than animals (primary consumers) in the second trophic level, the number of secondary consumer organisms is less than the primary consumers, and the number of tertiary consumer organisms is less than the secondary consumer organisms.