ENERGY IN ECOSYSTEMS Grade 9 Biology Unit

The of all energy in ecosystem is the source It gives us light warms It the surface of the earth It gives energy needed to from Lakes and oceans to evaporate water form precipitation It provides energy used by to make the compounds they use as and indirectly to provide other organisms green plants food food.

Photosynthesis ONE WAY The process by which green plants use sunlight to produce a sugar. glucose ****resulting in ENERGY**** In a food chain/web, energy flow is ONE WAY Producer  1 Consumer  2 Consumer As energy is within an ecosystem From organism to organism , it changes transferred form.

stay alive! Plants convert sunlight into Plants use chemical energy to etc. Animals use chemical energy to , keep etc. chemical energy grow move warm Not all energy a plant creates reaches the animal That eats it, because the plant uses much of it to stay alive!

Of the energy supplied by Earth’s producers: ~ is lost through ~ is lost to ~ goes to 65% metabolism 20% decomposers 15% primary consumers In every ecosystem, there is available to the consumer than the consumer. less energy secondary primary

Why? Producers use suns energy to Primary consumers use whatever is to maintain their . There is only a little left to Secondary consumers only receive a of the energy originally by the producer live “left over” lives “pass on” small fraction stored For an ecosystem to work, there must be in order to provide consumers with enough more producers than consumers energy to survive.

Food Web