Energy in Coastal Food Webs
8th Grade · Science · 45 min
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Learning Objective
I can describe the flow of energy in a coastal food web.
- 1
In a coastal food web, sea otters are considered a keystone species because they control the population of sea urchins, which eat kelp.
- 2
A food web represents the transfer of energy between species through trophic interactions, such as predator-prey relationships.
- 3
Removing a keystone species like the sea otter can cause cascading effects, leading to urchin blooms and reduced kelp beds, thus disrupting the flow of energy.
