Diagram 1 shows a food web containing eight food chains that are marked numerically, i.e. each number indicates a food chain involving the primary producer up to the apex consumer. Refer to Diagram 2 for the categories of consumers in a food chain presented hierarchically. Describe the food web through these links, drawing examples from your natural environment, in at least 150 words. Use the following additional information if necessary: Primary producers (plants) occupy the bottom level in a food chain/food web; Apex consumers (hawk in Diagram 1) occupy the top level.

Our natural environment comprises several ecosystems, and

food

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chains

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are crucial to sustaining them. Diagram 1 depicts a

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web with eight small

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chains

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found very close to human habitation. The

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is at the top of the web as an apex

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while

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the plants, primary producers, are at the bottom. In the first

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, the plants are eaten by the rabbits who are hunted by the

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.

Likewise

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, there are mice and seed-eating birds that are dependent on plants for survival and are consumed by the

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, shown in the second and fourth

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. The mice

also

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contribute to the third

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chain

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where they are eaten by the snakes as secondary consumers, who in turn become a meal for the

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at the apex. In the fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth

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, the grasshopper is at the primary

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level

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. It is directly fed by the

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in the fifth

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chain

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. In the sixth, the frog as a secondary

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feeds on it, followed by the snake at the tertiary

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and the

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thereafter

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ends with the

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. The grasshopper is eaten by other insects in the seventh

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. These insects are consumed at the tertiary

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by insect-eating birds that sustain the

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. The eighth

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chain

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has the highest number of links and includes all the hierarchical consumers listed in Diagram 2. It bifurcates from the

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of the insects as secondary consumers

,

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and has the frog as the tertiary, the snake as the quaternary and

finally

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the

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as the apex

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. The

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web reveals how damaging a single link can result in a widespread imbalance in nature.