energy, biomass and food chains

Question 1

biomass

Answer 1

• dry mass of an organism- amount of energy an organism has in it- water is not included- not useable energy - less biomass is stored at each trophic level, so length of food chains is therefore limited by the amount of energy lost at each stage- biomass is lost in faeces as some of the food animals eat cant be digested

Question 2

pyramids of number

Answer 2

• the number of organisms at each topic level can be represented in a pyramid of numbers- each level is called a trophic level- size of each level represents the number of organisms feeding at that level