biomass

• • biomass is the mass of living material of an organis
• • biomass is lost between each trophic level
  • producers only transfer about 1% of energy from light for photosynthesis
  • onl about 10% of biomass from each trophic level is transferred to the next level
• biomass is lost because of:

  • some parts of plants and organisms are inedible
  • not all ingested material is absorbed, some is released as faeces
  • some absorbed material is lost as waste - large amounts of glucose used in respiration produces carbon dioxide and water as waste, urea in urine
• efficiency of biomass transfer = biomass transferred to next level/biomass available at previous level x 100