Question

Explain the three general types of ecological pyramids

Answer 1

There are three ways we can represent the trophic levels in an ecological pyramid: the amount of organisms (number), the mass of all the organisms in each level (biomass), or the amount of energy contained in each level.

Number Pyramids

Number pyramids are ecological pyramids that show the actual number of organisms in the environment. Usually there are the most producers, since they supply energy for the rest of the pyramid. As we move up in trophic level, the number of organisms usually decreases. This is because less energy is available to the next level from the previous. In fact, this is known as the 10% rule in biology, which says each trophic level only gets 10% of the energy of the level below it.

For example, when plants absorb energy from the sun, they get 100%, or all of that energy. But they have to spend some to live, grow and reproduce. So when a caterpillar eats the plant, they can only get, at most, 10% of the energy the plant originally received from the sun.

MARK AS BRAINLIST  

┏─━─━─━─━∞◆∞━─━─━─━─┓

✭✮ ӇƠƤЄ ƖƬ ӇЄԼƤ MƛƳ ƳƠƲ ✭✮

┗─━─━─━─━∞◆∞━─━─━─━─┛

Answer 2

$\Large{\underline{\underline{\bf{Ecological\: Pyramids:-}}}}$

An ecological pyramids is a graphic representation of the numbers or the amount of accumulated energy at different trophic level. The biotic components of an ecosystem are linearly arranged in a interacting manner to form ecological pyramids.

Types of Ecological Pyramids:-

• Pyramid of Numbers
• Pyramid of Biomass
• Pyramid of energy

Pyramid of Numbers: They show the relationship between the producers, herbivores and carnivores at successive trophic levels in terms of their number. There are a great number of organisms at the lower trophic level of an ecosystem, the greatest number being at the producer level. As we go to higher trophic level the number of organisms at each trophic level goes on decreasing.

Pyramid of Biomass: Biomass is the living mass of organisms of a food chain. This pyramid indicates the decrease in Biomass at trophic level from base to apex . The biomass of the producer (plants) is the greatest.

Pyramid of Energy: It indicates the total energy content at each trophic level of the food chain. Pyramid of energy is always upright as there is always a gradual decrease in energy content at successive trophic level from the producers to consumers.

$\Large{\underline{\underline{\bf{Thanks}}}}$