toidusahela

Toiduahela, often translated as food chain, describes the flow of energy through an ecosystem. It begins with producers, typically plants, which convert sunlight into energy through photosynthesis. Primary consumers, or herbivores, then eat these producers, obtaining energy from them. Secondary consumers, which can be carnivores or omnivores, prey on primary consumers. Tertiary consumers, at the top of the food chain, feed on secondary consumers. Scavengers consume dead organisms at any level of the food chain, and decomposers, such as bacteria and fungi, break down dead organic matter, returning essential nutrients to the soil, which then become available for producers to use again.

Each level in a food chain is known as a trophic level. Energy is lost at each transfer between trophic levels, meaning that higher trophic levels contain less energy than lower ones. This concept is often illustrated as a pyramid of energy. A food chain is a simplified representation; in reality, ecosystems are far more complex and are better described by food webs, which show multiple interconnected food chains. The health of an ecosystem depends on the stability and balance of its food chains. Disruptions at one level can have cascading effects on all other levels.