How do toxins affect a food chain?
Toxic materials are poisonous. Some quickly break down into harmless substances in the environment. These substances accumulate in the food chain and damage the organisms in it, particularly in the predators at the end of the chain. This is because accumulating compounds cannot be excreted.
What do you think would happen to a food chain if the producers died off or were removed?
The removal of the producers would cause the collapse of the entire food web. Primary consumers or herbivores, which feed on producers directly, would die off. Higher level consumers would suffer as organisms from lower trophic levels start to die off.
How would a Decomposer be affected by the toxins in an environment?
Decomposers. The decomposers such as bacteria and fungi break down (feed on) dead organisms, releasing minerals and nutrients back into the food web. This interdependence is also how toxins can be moved through the food web.
What happens to the level of contamination of toxins as you move up the food chain?
Biomagnification is the build up of toxins in a food chain. The DDT concentration is in parts per million. As the trophic level increases in a food chain, the amount of toxic build up increases. Toxins build up in organism’s fat and tissue.
What part of the food chain is most affected by toxins?
Bioaccumulation occurs when toxins build up – or accumulate – in a food chain. The animals at the top of the food chain are affected most severely. Small amounts of toxic substances – often pesticides or pollution from human activity – are absorbed by plants.
What happens if you remove something from a food web?
The removal of the producers would cause the collapse of the entire food web. Primary consumers or herbivores, which feed on producers directly, would die off. The next to be affected would be the secondary consumers or carnivores that eat the primary consumers.
Which food chain correctly describes the flow?
Which of the following food chain correctly describes the flow of energy in an ecosystem? Explanation: Usually energy flows from one trophic level to the next higher trophic level. In the above answer, grass is the lowest trophic level and it is a producer. Goat eats grass to get energy.
What are the sources of the toxic chemicals that can build up in food chains?
Because the animals tend to eat lots of organisms from the level below in food chains, the concentration of pesticide in the bodies of organisms increases at higher levels of food chains. This can result in the toxicity of the pollutant reaching fatal levels in the organisms at the top of the food chain.
What level of the food chain is most affected by biomagnification?
In many cases, animals near the top of the food chain are most affected because of a process called biomagnification. Many of the most dangerous toxins settle to the seafloor and then are taken in by organisms that live or feed on bottom sediments.
What happens if you remove something from an ecosystem?
When a organism is removed, the organism who eats or hunt them will decrease some because they lost one of the food source even though they still have other food sources. This new organism will brake the balance of the ecosystem so their food sources will decrease by having too many predators that hunt and eat them.
