Lesson 2 Bast Animals need energy to live and grow. Where do you think this energy comes from? Where do you get the energy you need to live and grow?How much energy do living things use? Purpose Find out how much energy passes to living things as food eneray. Procedure mnereete ri) Working in groups of four, make labels that read “Sun,” “Plant,” “Plant meter stick Eater,” and “Meat Eater. scissors butcher paper e Cut out a 1m strip of butcher paper. Mark off ten 10 cm sections. This represents energy that can be used by living things. © Each student should take a label. The “Sun” starts by passing the energy strip to the “plant.” The plant cuts off 10 cm from the strip. The plant holds the larger section and e smaller section to the plant eater. sents the passing of food energy The plant eater cuts off 1 cm from the strip and passes it to the meat eater. The plant eater holds onto the larger section. Draw Conclusions e Why do you think the energy strip gets ripped before it gets passed on? © why is the smallest amount of eneray passed to the meat eater? Explore (wll What might happen if the plant could not make its own food energy? Design a test to find out. Qe: a . SorelRead and Learn . as2a Main Idea 41s 2 41826 Food chains describe the flow of matter and energy among living things in an environment. A complete food chain includes producers, consumers, and decomposers. Vocabulary food chain, p38 producer, p. 38 consumer, p 38 @ Www.macmillanmh.com Reading Skill Sequence of energy for Solar energy is the main source What is a food chain? You know that living things need energy to live and grow. They get energy from food. A food chain shows how energy passes from one organism to another as food. First, a plant uses the Sun’s energy to make its own food. Next, an animal such as an insect eats the plant. Then, another animal, such as a bird, eats that insect. Energy passes from the Sun, to the plant, to the insect, to the bird. Green plants in a food chain are called producers. They are called this because they make, or produce, their own food, Animals are called Animals cannot make their own food. They must eat, or consume, plants or other animals for food. A mustard plant takes in energy from the Sun to make its own food. ¥Energy in Food Chains With each step of the food Most food chains are similar chain, matter and energy pass from in a few ways. Sunlight is at the one organism to another. Because beginning of nearly all food chains. —_ organisms use most of the energy in A plant, or producer, is next in the food to live and grow, only a small chain. Then, an animal cats the amount of energy is passed from plant. Next, an animal eats the organism to organism. plant eater. The chain continues until tiny living things break down © auiek check organisms and return nutrients to a the soil. These tiny living things Sequence Whatis the first step are EEESREESEEE. The nutrients ofa food chain? they return to the soil are used by new Critical Thinking How are a plants, and the chain begins again. producer and a consumer different? How does energy move through this food chain? Clue: Arrows help show a sequence. A mountain lion eats the weasel. > AA gopher eats the mustard plant. When the mountain lion dies, its body is broken down by decomposers. > A weasel eats the gopher. > 39 EXPLAINWhat are herbivores? The gopher in the mountain food chain is an example of a herbivore (HUR+buh-vawr). Herbivores are animals that eat mainly plants. They are also known as primary consumers because they are the first consumers in a food chain. Examples of herbivores include deer, rabbits, grasshoppers, squirrels, and cows. caterpillar These are just a few examples of animals that eat plants as — their main food source. > mountain goatWide Varieties Herbivores can be found in most environments on Earth. They live in oceans, forests, deserts, and grasslands. They even live in the cold arctic environment that surrounds the North Pole. Herbivores live in every environment where plants grow. Herbivores can be big or small. ‘The African elephant, Earth's largest land animal, is a herbivore that eats mainly grasses. An adult elephant eats between 100 and 200 kilograms (220 and 440 pounds) of plant matter every day! In North America’s grasslands, herbivores can include animals from tiny insects to very large buffaloes. Passing Along Energy Herbivores can be food for other animals. An animal that is hunted by another animal for food is called prey. An animal that hunts another animal for food is called a predator. Both predator and prey are consumers because they both must eat food to survive. p Quick Check Sequence Which comes first in a food chain, a herbivore or a producer? Critical Thinking How might traveling together help hervivores stay safe? al EXPLAINnivores ani You know that animals that eat mainly plants are called herbivores. What are animals that eat mainly other animals called? How about animals that eat both plants and animals? Each group has a name to describe it. An orca whale is a carnivore. Carnivores Animals that eat other animals are called SERIE. Exarnples of carnivores include cats that eat mice and hawks that eat other birds. Frogs that eat insects and snakes that eat rabbits are also carnivores. In some cases, carnivores eat other carnivores. Hawks, for example, often eat snakes. Herons eat frogs, and lizards eat spiders. AA heron is a carnivore.Some animals, such as bears, seem to eat everything! They eat such living things as fish, berries, leaves, mice, and squirrels. Are bears carnivores because they eat animals? Are they herbivores because they eat plants? In fact, bears are called omnivores. is an animal that eats both plants and animals. Other examples of omnivores include raccoons, pigs, dogs, and chickens. Some insects, such as wasps and flies, will eat both plants and animals. Most people are omnivores, too. People eat from a wide mix of plant and animal food groups. Both omnivores and carnivores are called secondary consumers. “A hornet is an omnivore. It eats both plants and animals. @ auick check Sequence What eats a primary consumer in a food chain? Critical Thinking Can an omnivore and carnivore be in the same food chain? Explain. Quick Lab Find a Food Chain © Take a walk @ partner around the schoolyard. Make a chart to list the plants and animals that you see. Classify Which organisms are producers? Why? Classify Which organisms are consumers? Why? Communicate Circle organisms that might belong to the same food chain and link them together. What organisms are in your food chain? Producers | Consumers A bear is an omnivore. ns} iSCUNOWhat are decomposers? Each fall and winter, thousands of | fall to the forest floor. Some trees also fall down. Yet some of this plant material is gone by the following spring. There are fewer dead leaves on the ground. The fallen trees are rotting away. Who, or what, is responsible for this cleanup? It is decomposers that do this important job for an environment. Decomposers break down organisms that are no longer living. They break them down into nutrients that can be used again by new plants. 4 Vultures eat rotting animal matter and get rid of it as waste. This helps decomposers break down matter faster.The decomposers growing on this log A Most earthworms eat plant life that are called fungi. They slowly break has already died. Earthworms pass down this fallen log. nutrients from dead plants to the soil. Special Jobs for Decomposers There are many types of decomposers. Each breaks down a special type of organism. For example, earthworms break down plants only. Plantlike organisms called fungi (FUNsjigh) break down rotting Some insects, like c, this beetle, are wood and other plant parts. Still other decomposers 5 decomposers. break down what is left of dead animals. Decomposers ‘Ottier:lngect that consume dead matter are also consumers. decomposers include flies and Decomposers work together to break down waned organisms completely. The once-living material may become part of the soil. This material adds nutrients to soil that help plants to grow well. Now the food chain can start all over again! Quick Check Sequence Why does a food chain start again after a decomposer does its job? Critical Thinking How do decomposers help an environment? EXPLAINWhere does the fish in this diagram get its energy? Clue Find out where the arrow that points to the fish comes from. What are some examples of food chains? Every environment has its own food chains. However, the same basic parts of each are the same. Here are some examples of food chains you might find in California. Can you identify which organisms are the producers and consumers in each? A pond food chain might start with a plantlike producer called algae (Atsjee). These algae float in the water collecting sunlight. They are food for young mayflies, which eagerly gobble them up. The mayflies swarm near the surface of the water and become food for sunfish. The sunfish are then eaten by the blue heron. Finally, decomposers break the heron down after it dies. In the California desert, seed pods of the mesquite tree are food for harvester ants. The ants live in large colonies of thousands. The ants become food for the horned lizard. These lizards, in turn, are eaten by larger animals such as coyotes. @ auick check Sequence What is the order of a California desert food chain? Critical Thinking Can one environment have more than one food chain?