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Tertiary Consumers: Bobcat Mountain Lion

The document describes a food web with multiple trophic levels including producers, primary consumers, secondary consumers, and tertiary consumers. It also includes questions about the food web related to abundance at different trophic levels, generalist vs specialist consumers, keystone species, effects of more generalist or specialist species, impacts of overfishing the top predator, and impacts of excess nutrients on producers.

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mrbest.bro.bry04
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26 views3 pages

Tertiary Consumers: Bobcat Mountain Lion

The document describes a food web with multiple trophic levels including producers, primary consumers, secondary consumers, and tertiary consumers. It also includes questions about the food web related to abundance at different trophic levels, generalist vs specialist consumers, keystone species, effects of more generalist or specialist species, impacts of overfishing the top predator, and impacts of excess nutrients on producers.

Uploaded by

mrbest.bro.bry04
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
Download as pdf or txt
Download as pdf or txt
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Tertiary

Consumers

Mountain Bobcat
Lion
Trophic Level

Secondary
Consumers

Fox
Frog

Primary
Consumers Eagle

Mickey
Grasshopper
Squirrel
Beetle

Producers

Tree
Questions
1.
Are organisms more abundant at some trophic levels than others? (Please note: the abundance of organisms-how many
individuals there are is different than the number of species.) Why, or why not?
Organisms are more abundant in lower trophic levels because there is more available energy from food sources to sustain a
larger amount of biomass compared to higher trophic levels, as a result more individuals can be sustained at lower trophic levels.
2.
Are the consumers in your food web generalists or specialists?
The consumers are mainly generalists because they do not rely on just one or a few food sources.
3.
In every food web, there are some species that have a greater effect than others on the rest of the food web: if their populations
go up or down, it changes the populations of many other organisms. In your food web, which species (one or more) would have
this effect on the others, and why?
Mountain lions would have an effect on the overall food web. If the number of mountain lions increased the number of frogs and
eagles would drop because they are being overhunted by the increased number of predators. This would cause the number of
mice, grasshoppers, squirrels, and beetles to increase because there are less predators hunting them. This would further go on
to cause the number of trees to decrease because there are now more primary consumers eating them. This is what happens if
the number of mountain lions increased and the opposite would occur if the number of mountain lions decreased.
Questions Continued
4.
How will the interactions in your food web change if you had a) more generalist species or b) more specialist species?
A generalist species has a less specialized diet and has an easier time adapting to new environments if needed, whereas
the specialist species has a more distinct diet and has a harder time adapting to new environments. Interactions in our food
web would change if we had more generalist species as there would be less resources available for the other organisms in
the environment. In contrast, if we had more specialist species we would have less of one resource, but more of another,
which could alter the balance within the environment.
5.
Commercial demand for the species at the highest trophic level in your food web results in their being fished/hunted
almost to extinction. Describe what would happen to the populations of the other species in your web.
Prey become over-abundant, causing a reduction in green plants due to herbivore consumption. As a result, there would be
loss in biodiversity, increase in selective vegetation consumption, and changes in primary production.

6.
There is an influx of inorganic nutrients into your habitat. What effects does this have on the producers and the
populations of the other species in your food web?
An overpopulation of producers can have significant impacts on the balance of an ecosystem–due to an influx of herbivores
to compensate–potentially leading to changes in biodiversity and ecosystem function.

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