3. A food web is an interlocking system of independent food chains. The flow of energy is represented by an arrow. The arrow poi
nts in the direction in which the energy is being transferred. Example: Mouse → Snake (because the snake eats the mouse). Answer the following questions: a. What do you notice about how plants get their energy?
b. Describe the direction of the arrows in the food web.
c. What would happen to the population of snakes and rabbits if hawks were removed from the ecosystem?
a. plants get their energy through photosynthesis with the sun
b. Arrows in a food web start with the prey and go up to the top animals... example would be sun to grass to bunny to hawk to eagle. The web should be interlocking and not have any empty points, unlike a food chain
c. if hawks were removed from the food chain the rabbit and snake populations would increase rapidly. This is because the top predator was taken away. This happened in Yellowstone when people shot all the wolves and the elk populations grew out of control.
