Question

In a food chain, if 10,000 joules of energy is available to the producer, how much energy will be available to the secondary consumer to transfer it to the tertiary consumer?

Calculate the amount of energy available to the organisms at the fourth trophic level. If the energy available to the organisms at the second trophic level is 2000 J

Green plants capture about 1% of the solar energy incident on the earth to carry out the process of photosynthesis. A part of this trapped energy is used by plants in performing their metabolic activities and some energy is released as heat into the atmosphere. When these green plants are eaten up by herbivores, the chemical energy stored in the plants is transferred to these animals. These animals (herbivores) utilise some of this energy for metabolic activities and some energy is released as heat while the remaining energy is stored in their body. This process of energy transfer is repeated till top carnivores. In an ecosystem, transfer of energy follows 10 percent law, i.e,, only 10 percent of the energy is transferred to each trophic level from the lower trophic level.

Food web is the interconnection of different food chains, which correlate at various trophic levels operating in an ecosystem.