some dull questions

1. Explain why efficiency is lower in the small mammal that feeds on plants than the insect that feeds on plants?

Is that something to do with surface area to volume ratio??

2. Explain why efficinecy is lower in the small mammal that feeds on animals than the small mammal that feeds on plants?Ive written... The mammal that feeds on other animals is at a higher trophic level than the mammal who eats plants. As energy is lost as you travel up the higher trophich levels, this causes lower efficiney.

3. Explain why the toal energy cosumed as food by the secondary consumers is less than the total energy consumed as food by the primary consumers?

Is this because at each trophic level, there is loss of food in terms of respiration of animals and plants. Also energy is lost in faecas.

Reply 1

firestone

1) Mammals are warm-blooded, insects are not, so more energy will be lost as heat to keep a constant body temperature. Perhaps more energy is lost in the digestive system of the mammal since it has gut bacteria...do insects have gut bacteria? Or maybe the digestive system is larger in the mammal and they eat more, so more energy goes into digestion in a given time? More faeces than insects? :confused:

Another possibility, do insects just eat what they could digest, or do they eat also the woody/fiberous material that mammals eat as well and do not have the enzymes to so cannot digest - hence more of the plant material that they eat might be lost? Are mammals more active? Maybe not because insects fly, but do mammals need more energy for more active transport, organ function, muscle contraction etc.? These are just possibilities that I could think of, probably wrong though! :redface:

2) Yep, more energy has been lost when the energy has transferred up more trophic levels. :smile:

3) Fewer secondary consumers than primary consumers are present in the food chain so consume less energy in total, maybe also because of what you said, that the food they eat has lost more energy having passed through more trophic levels (respiration, energy transfer being inefficient, faeces, body temperature etc.), but wouldn't each individual organism consume as much energy as they need?

Reply 2

morgo

I would go along with most of what you said. I have a few more questions if u have some time

Reply 3

firestone

Yeah sure, post away :biggrin:

If I don't know the answer hopefully someone else would. :smile:

Reply 4

nikk

firestone

do insects have gut bacteria?

Yep. Anything with a gut will have an active microflora.

Reply 5

Revenged

nikk

Yep. Anything with a gut will have an active microflora.

Yeah, there is bacteria convering all services of the body... Gut microflora is very important in digestion in the large intestine, which is why it's important...

There are only a few places where the body that are 'sterile' - such as in cerebrospinal fluid (spine and around the brain) and the blood...