1. Discuss why it is important in the study of ecology to consider how an organism lives with respect to its environment. P½Œ 2. Discuss the laws of thermodynamics and why there is not recycling of energy as there is of chemicals in an ecosystem.
3. Discuss why the flow of energy in a food web can be represented as a pyramid and why the largest energy level, largest number of individuals, and largest mass are all located on the producer level.
4. Discuss why a high-level predator such as swordfish would be expected to (and does) contain higher levels of a pollutant such as mercury than would a plankton-eatio ÍÕish.
5. Point out that the diet of the organism, not the
size of the organism, is what makes it part of its trophic level,
not the size of the organism. For example, baleen whales and the
largest sharks (whale sharks) both eat plankton.