whcih of the following best explains why there are fewer producers than consumers?
A ) heat energy given off from producers kills off primary and secondary consumers
B ) secondary consumers have less cell processes that need energy
C ) around 10% of the energy is transferred to support the next trophic level
D ) most secondary consumers can absorb radiant energy from the sun.
C) around 10% of the energy is transferred to support the next trophic level
This is the best explanation for why there are fewer producers than consumers. In ecological systems, energy transfer between trophic levels is not efficient; typically, only about 10% of the energy at one trophic level is passed on to the next level. This concept is known as the 10% rule in the context of energy transfer in food chains. Producers, usually plants and other photosynthetic organisms, convert sunlight into chemical energy through the process of photosynthesis. This energy supports their own growth and reproduction. When primary consumers (herbivores) eat the producers, they can only capture about 10% of the energy that the producers had stored in their biomass to support their own growth and survival. When secondary consumers (carnivores) eat the primary consumers, they further capture only about 10% of the energy from the primary consumers, and so on up the food chain.
As a result, fewer individuals can be supported at each successive trophic level, which leads to a pyramid-type shape when the number of organisms at each trophic level is graphed, with the widest part of the pyramid at the bottom representing the large number of producers required to support the rest of the food chain.