20 Examples of Food Chains - encyclopedia

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Steps in the food chain
Fragility of food chains
Examples of food chains

The food chains or Trophic chains They are the cycle of transmission of energy and matter that involves the different species of a biological community, in which each one feeds on the previous ones and serves as sustenance for the next ones.

Each link in this food chain is called a trophic level and determines the relationship of each species with those that are higher or lower in the cycle: predators and prey respectively.

However, this cycle feeds back when large predators die and provide food for scavengers and decomposing microorganisms that transform their remains and, ultimately, make them compost for plant life.

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Examples of Food Chains

Steps in the food chain

Broadly speaking, any food chain is made up of the following steps:

Producing organizations. Usually photosynthetic, they are plant beings autotrophs, which take advantage of water, sunlight and nutrients from the soil.
Herbivores or harvesters. Animals that feed on vegetation or its fruits.
Small predators. Animals that prey on small herbivores or feed on young and eggs, or decomposing animals.
Large predators. Large carnivores that survive by feeding on herbivores and other predators.
Decomposers. Animals that "recycle" organic matter, decomposing it and returning it to its original states, for its use by producing organisms. Fungi, bacteria, insects and scavengers make up the bulk of this rung.

See also: Examples of Predator and Prey

Fragility of food chains

The usual problems of food chains they take place when the disappearance of some intermediate link occurs, which leads to the disorderly proliferation of the lower species and, consequently, to unfair competition that leads to the extinction of other species, as the biological balance is lost and the entropy of the system increases.

The same happens when a lower rung is extinguished and the immediately superior species resent the decrease in their share of nutrients, having to look for it elsewhere or also succumbing to the population decline.

Many ecological initiatives try to make visible the impact of human activities and mass extinctions in food chains, to show that they are never isolated events and that, eventually, everything has consequences in the order of nature.

It can serve you: Examples of Helpful and Harmful Animals

Examples of food chains

The phytoplankton (vegetable) that lives in the oceans serves as food for malacostráceous crustaceans (krill), in turn eaten by small fish. These, once again, are preyed upon by slightly older fish, such as sardines, frequent food for larger predators such as barracuda. However, upon death, these large and aggressive fish are decomposed by scavengers and the cycle restarts.
The rabbits grasslands eat plants and grasses, are preyed upon by pumas, foxes and other mammals carnivores medium size. And when they die, they provide food for carrion birds such as vultures.
The fleshy leaf plants they are parasitized by the caterpillars of butterflies, food in turn for various small birds, which are hunted by snakes and wildcats, whose bodies, again, will be decomposed by bacteria and fungi.
Many flying insects Like the lobster they eat the leaves of the plants, but the insectivorous toads eat them and are preyed upon by rodents such as the mongoose. And these are eaten by snakes.
The marine zooplankton and krill serve as food for whales, who catch them by the ton with their long bales to filter the water. These are preyed upon by man, and much of their organic matter returns to the sea as waste and is food for zooplankton.
The meat of the dead animals serves as an incubator and immediate food for the fly larvae, which in a short time will become imagos. Then they will be preyed upon by spiders, also victims of other larger spiders, which serve as food for different spider birds, finally preyed upon by hunting snakes such as bells.
The grass nourishes goats, favorite victims of jaguars and other similar felines, which when they die provide food for bacteria and fungi, which nourish the initial grass again.
The bark of many trees provides food for parasitic fungi, in turn, food for small rodents, which are hunted by birds of prey such as owls or owls.
The waves that hit the stones push the marine phytoplankton to the colonies of bivalves such as mussels, which devour them. These, in turn, are preyed upon by crabs and the latter by seagulls that hunt them with pecks.
The famous dung beetles They feed on the remains of the faeces of higher animals. At the same time they are preyed upon by insectivorous lizards and lizards, who are the food of quadruped mammals such as coyotes. These are killed by the man with bullets.
The bees They subsist on floral nectar, but are preyed upon by small birds, whose eggs feed nocturnal rodents such as the opossum. This, however, is hunted by snakes and birds of prey.
Back in the sea, small mollusks like the squid They are mainly preyed upon by medium-sized fish, which in turn provide food for seals and marine mammals, eventually hunted by the voracious orca whales.
In the microscopic world, decomposing organic matter supports the bacteria, which give the same to protozoa (such as free-living amoebae) and these to certain nematodes (worms), which in turn provide sustenance for larger nematodes.
The butterflies They eat floral or fruit nectar, but are food for predatory insects such as the ferocious praying mantis.This is also eaten by insectivorous bats, which when they die will return nutrients to the soil to feed the flowering or fruit plants.
The large herbivores like the zebra they feed on wild herbs and shrubs, but are preyed upon by crocodiles when they are about to drink water. Nobody preys on these, but time is in charge of converting them into organic matter to nourish wild herbs and weeds.
The Earthworms They feed on decomposing organic matter that they get from the earth itself. They are food for small birds, which peck them out, and which in turn are victims of hunting felines, such as the wild cat. When they die, they return to the earth the organic matter that will feed new worms.
The corn harvested by man, it serves as food for free-range chickens, whose eggs are stolen and eaten by weasels. These are hunted by snakes, and they are killed by the hand of man.
Many water spiders They hunt larvae or pupae of other insects, but they serve as prey for the fish that stalk them underwater. These are preyed upon by the kingfisher bird, which in turn is fed by birds of prey such as the hawk.
The woodworms They feed on the bark of dead trees and are eaten by long-beaked birds. They lay new ones that some snakes eat, and these in turn eggs that other rodents can eat. Finally, the cycle will end a larger predator, such as the eagle.
The ticks they inhabit the fur of mammals (they feed on blood) and are food for symbiotic birds that clean the fur of these large mammals, such as buffalo. It feeds on herbs, but is preyed upon by large felines such as the tiger.