How Nature Works in Harmony

Overview

Living things and their surroundings depend on one another. This chapter explains ecosystems, food chains, food webs, and how energy and nutrients flow through nature in balance.

Key concepts

• An ecosystem includes living organisms and their non-living environment.
• Producers (plants) make food using sunlight.
• Consumers eat plants or other animals.
• Decomposers break down dead matter and recycle nutrients.
• A food chain shows how energy passes from one organism to another.

Important terms / formulae

• Ecosystem: living and non-living things interacting in an area.
• Food chain: a sequence of who eats whom.
• Food web: many interlinked food chains.
• Decomposer: organism that breaks down dead matter.

Solved example or key process

A simple food chain: grass to grasshopper to frog to snake. Grass (producer) makes food; the grasshopper eats grass; the frog eats the grasshopper; the snake eats the frog. Energy flows along this chain, and decomposers return nutrients to the soil.

Important questions

1. What is an ecosystem?
2. Differentiate between producers, consumers, and decomposers.
3. Construct a simple food chain.
4. Why are decomposers important in nature?

Quick revision

Nature works in balance through ecosystems. Producers make food, consumers eat, and decomposers recycle nutrients. Energy flows along food chains and food webs, keeping nature in harmony.