Week 2 Vocabulary
- Food Chain: Sequence of who eats whom in an ecosystem
- Trophic Level: Positions in a food chain, also energy level
- Primary producer: producer that creates food using a primary energy source
- Autotroph: organism that creates its own food
- Primary Consumer: animals that eat the primary producer, mostly herbivores
- Heterotroph: organism that cannot make its own food and must eat to obtain energy
- Secondary Consumer: animals that eat the primary consumer, can be carnivores or omnivores
- Tertiary Consumer: animals that eat secondary consumers, mostly carnivores
- Top Predator: animal in an ecosystem or food chain that is not eaten by any other animal
- Predator: animal that eats other animals, carnivores
- Detrivore: organism that consumes or breaks down decaying matter (dead plants and animals)
- Food Web: several food chains related to each other in which animals can be classified in several trophic levels
- Niche: organisms role in an ecosystem
- Micro Ecosystem: small ecosystem, examples include puddles, tree logs, and under rocks
- Messo Ecosystem: medium size ecosystems such as forests or large lakes
- Biome:A very large ecosystem or collection of ecosystems with similar biotic and abiotic factors such as an entire Rain forest with millions of animals and trees, with many different water bodies running through them.