The producers and consumers that live in the deciduous forest ecosystem are all ecologically linked based on their trophic levels. The diagram below shows the flow of energy (signified by red arrows) through the ecosystem. The sun serves as the primary energy source. Only 1% of its possible energy gets passed on to producers. Going up each level of the pyramid, only 10% of the available energy gets passed on. Because of this, animals higher up on the pyramid require more frequent feeding so that they get the same amount of energy as organisms further down.
Food webs also show the ecological relationship between species. Animals at the top of the web eat animals or plants below them. The black arrows point from the prey to the predator. The food web in a deciduous forest consists of lots of primary consumers that are eaten by just a few secondary consumers. Below is one possible food web describing the forest I observed.
Decomposers also link organisms at different ecological levels. When an animal or plant dies, decomposers go to work to break them down and return their nutrients to the soil. The nutrients are then absorbed by the plants' roots and when the primary consumers eat the plants (and the secondary consumers eat the primary consumers) the nutrients are cycled through the different levels of the ecosystem.
Decomposers in a forest ecosystem include worms, fungi, bacteria, and larvae.
Decomposers in a forest ecosystem include worms, fungi, bacteria, and larvae.