Question

What are the two characteristics of energy flow in an ecosystem?

Answer 1

The energy flow in the ecosystem has two characteristics:

1. The energy flow is unidirectional and linear. It means energy can flow in a fixed direction, from lower levels to higher levels. i.e., $\mathrm{Producers}\to \mathrm{Primary}\mathrm{consumers}\to \mathrm{Secondary}\mathrm{consumers}\to \mathrm{others}$.
2. The 10% law. Only 10% of the total energy present in a level is transferable to the higher levels. The rest is lost to the surroundings in form of community heat.
3. Due to the 10% Law, we can say that the longer the food chain the least energy is obtained by the top-level consumer.
4. For example, consider the image below:

Here, we can observe that the food chain is linear and unidirectional without any branching. Also, the energy consumed by the lion is the least. With the increase in the number of intermediaries, the lion receives an even lesser amount of energy.

These are the two characteristics of the energy flow in an ecosystem.