Answered: A human requires 1 chicken/day There…

Applications and Investigations in Earth Science (9th Edition)

9th Edition

ISBN:9780134746241

Author:Edward J. Tarbuck, Frederick K. Lutgens, Dennis G. Tasa

Publisher:Edward J. Tarbuck, Frederick K. Lutgens, Dennis G. Tasa

Chapter1: The Study Of Minerals

Section: Chapter Questions

Problem 1LR

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Question

Background

A trophic level, or feeding level, is made up of all the organisms whose energy source is the same number of consumption steps from the sun in a given ecosystem. The trophic level of plants or producers is 1, while that of herbivores is 2 and that of animals that eat herbivores 3. Higher trophic levels can exist for animals even higher on the food chain. In this exercise, you will compute numerical values for human energy needs based on diets at different trophic levels.

In this case study the owner of a farm raises soybeans and chickens. Grasshoppers feed on the farmers soybeans, and are in turn eaten by the chickens. Humans can, though rarely do, eat grasshoppers for sustenance. Humans can also eat soybeans. For the purpose of this exercise, make the following assumptions:

A human requires 1 chicken/day
There are 365 days/year
1 chicken eats 25 grasshoppers/day
1 grasshopper requires about 30 g of soybeans/year
1,000 grasshoppers have a mass of 1 kg
1 human requires about 600 grasshoppers/day
Dry soybeans have about 3.3 cal/g
There are 1,000g/kg
A typical human requires 3,000 cal/day

Next, let’s eat only soybeans for a year instead of chickens or grasshoppers. How many people could we feed using the soybeans fed to grasshoppers (99,918.75kg)?
Generally speaking, would we be able to feed more humans if we ate at a lower trophic level more often? Why or why not?