if a primary consumer has 1000 joules of energy, how much would a tertiary consumer get?

Answer 1

Hi Haleigh,

When looking at a food pyramid, every time you go up a level only 10% of energy is transferred to the next level while 90% is lost to the environment. The easiest way to figure out how many joules of energy a tertiary consumer would have is to just take off 1 zero from each level as you go up. For example, primary would have 1000J, then secondary (take off one zero) would have 100J, and then tertiary (take off another zero) would have 10J. It’s still the 10% rule, just easier to figure out. I hope this helps!

if you have any other questions, feel free to reach out!

Answer 2

When you go up a level in the food energy pyramid, the next level up gets 10% of what the previous level had available. For example, the primary consumer is the lowest level on the pyramid, and the next level is a secondary consumer which gets 10% of what is available to the primary consumer. The next level up after secondary is the tertiary consumer which gets 10% of what is available to the secondary consumer. To find how much energy is available to the tertiary consumer from the primary consumer, we take 10% of the 10% (that is, 10% of energy to the secondary from primary, then 10% to the tertiary from the secondary) from the total available energy. 10% of 10% is 1%, and 1% from 1000J is 10J; therefore, 10J is your final answer!

Message me for questions :)