Question

What are consumers? How are they categorised?

Answer 1

Consumers:

1. Consumers are a group of organisms that feed upon other organisms to meet their food requirements.
2. Based upon their position in the trophic level and the kind of organism they feed on, consumers have been categorized into primary, secondary, tertiary and quaternary consumers.
3. Primary consumers belong to second trophic level and they feed upon producers. Example:
4. Secondary consumers belong to third trophic level and they feed upon primary consumers.
5. Tertiary consumers belong to fourth trophic level and they feed upon secondary consumers.
6. Quaternary consumers belong to the fifth trophic level and they feed upon tertiary consumers.
7. For example: In a food chain ; Grass→ Insects→ Frog→ Snake→ Eagle ; Insects are primary consumers, Frog is secondary consumer, Snake is a tertiary consumer and Eagle is a quaternary consumer.