Most living organisms eat organic food, this is the specificity of their life on our planet. Among this food are plants and the meat of other animals, their products of activity and dead matter, ready for decomposition. The process of nutrition in different species of plants and animals occurs in different ways, but so-called food chains are always formed . They transform matter and energy, and nutrients can thus transfer from one being to another, carrying out the circulation of substances in nature.
Forest food chain
Forests of various kinds cover quite a lot of land surface. It is the lungs and the cleansing tool of our planet. It is not for nothing that many progressive modern scholars and activists today oppose mass deforestation. The food chain in the forest can be quite diverse, but as a rule, it includes no more than 3-5 links. In order to understand the essence of the issue, we turn to the possible components of this chain.
Producers and consumers
- The first are autotrophic organisms that feed on inorganic food. They take energy and matter to create their own bodies, using gases and salts from their environment. As an example, green plants, which are powered by sunlight through photosynthesis. Or the numerous types of microorganisms that live everywhere: in the air, in soil, in water. It is the producers who make up the majority the first link in almost any food chain in the forest (examples will be given below).
- The second is heterotrophic organisms that feed on organics. Among them are first-order ones that directly carry out nutrition due to plants and bacteria, producers. Second order - those who eat animal food (predators or carnivores).
Plants
With them, as a rule, begins the food chain in the forest. They are the first link in this cycle. Trees and shrubs, grasses and mosses extract food from inorganic substances using sunlight, gases and minerals. A food chain in a forest, for example, can start with a birch tree, the bark of which is eaten by a hare, and a wolf kills and eats it, in turn.
Herbivorous animals
In various forests, animals that feed on plant foods are found in abundance. Of course, the tropical forest, for example, is very different in its content from the middle zone. Various species of animals live in the jungle, many of which are herbivores, which means they make up the second link of the food chain, eating plant foods. From elephants and rhinos to barely noticeable insects, from amphibians and birds to mammals. So, in Brazil, for example, there are more than 700 species of butterflies, almost all of them are herbivorous.
The fauna in the forest belt of the middle part of Russia is scarce, of course. Accordingly, the supply chain options in the mixed forest are much smaller. Squirrels and hares, other rodents, deer and moose, hares - this is the basis for such chains.
Predators or carnivores
They are called so because they eat the flesh, eating the meat of other animals. In the food chain, they occupy a dominant position, often being the final link. In our forests, these are foxes and wolves, owls and eagles, sometimes bears (but in fact they belong to omnivorous animals that can eat both plant and animal food). Both one and several predators eating each other can take part in the food chain. The final link, as a rule, is the largest and most powerful carnivore. In a middle-range forest, for example, a wolf can play this role. There are not too many such predators, and their population is limited by their nutritional base and energy reserves. Since, according to the law of conservation of energy, up to 90% of the resource may be lost in the transition of nutrients from one link to the next. This is probably why the number of links in most food chains cannot exceed five.
Scavengers
They feed on the remains of other organisms. Oddly enough, but there are also quite a lot of them in the nature of the forest: from microorganisms and insects to birds and mammals. Many beetles, for example, use the corpses of other insects and even vertebrates as food. And bacteria can decompose dead mammalian bodies in a fairly short time. Carrion organisms play a huge role in nature. They destroy matter, transforming it into inorganic substances, release energy, using it for their life. If not for scavengers, then, probably, the entire terrestrial space would be covered with the bodies of animals and plants that have died for all times.
Examples of power circuits in the forest
To make up a food chain in a forest, you need to know about those inhabitants who live there. And also about what these animals can eat.
- Birch bark - insect larvae - small birds - birds of prey.
- Leaves are bacteria.
- Butterfly caterpillar - mouse - snake - hedgehog - fox.
- Acorn - mouse - fox.
- Cereals - mouse - eagle owl.
There are also more authentic: burning leaves - bacteria - earthworms - mice - mole - hedgehog - fox - wolf. But, as a rule, the number of links is not more than five. The food chain in the spruce forest is slightly different from similar ones in the deciduous.
- Cereal Seeds - Sparrow - Wild Cat.
- Flowers (nectar) - butterfly - frog - really.
- Fir cone - woodpecker - eagle.
Food chains can sometimes intertwine, forming more complex, multi-level structures that combine into a single forest ecosystem. For example, the fox does not disdain to eat both insects and their larvae, and mammals, so several food chains intersect.