Raven pins a big sheet of paper to the workshop wall. She draws grass, a rabbit, a mouse, a fox and a hawk.
"Last week we drew single chains," she says. "But the hawk eats mice and rabbits. One line is not enough."
Rocket grabs a marker and starts drawing arrows everywhere. Soon it looks like a spider web.
Nova hums. "I found a pattern," she says. "Many chains, connected. What do you notice in the middle?"
"Everyone depends on everyone," Rocket says.
In every ecosystem, many food chains are connected. Together they make a food web.
Some animals eat plants. Other animals eat the animals that eat plants.
The food of almost any kind of animal can be traced back to plants.
| Living thing | What it eats in this meadow model | Its role |
|---|---|---|
| Grass | Makes its own food | Producer |
| Rabbit | Grass | Consumer |
| Mouse | Grass seeds | Consumer |
| Fox | Rabbits and mice | Consumer |
| Hawk | Rabbits and mice | Consumer |
| Mushrooms and bacteria | Dead plants and animals | Decomposer |
In a food chain, energy follows one path.
In a food web, energy can follow many paths.
The rabbit can be eaten by a fox or by a hawk. Both paths start with grass.
| Statement | True or false? |
|---|---|
| A food web is many food chains connected together. | ? |
| The fox is a producer. | ? |
| The food of almost any animal traces back to plants. | ? |
| Both the fox and the hawk eat mice. | ? |
You thought like an ecologist today. Tomorrow you go outside to find decomposers yourself.