Question

(a) Name and state the law given by Lindeman which tells us how much energy entering a particular trophic level of organisms is available for trasnsfer to the next higher trophic level. 

(b) How much energy will be available to hawks in the food chain comprising hawk, snake, paddy and mice, if 10,000 J of energy is available to paddy from the sun ?

Answer 1

(a) The law given by Lindeman is 10% law. According to 10% law, only 10% of the energy  entering a particular trophic level of organisms is available for transfer to next higher trophic  level.  

(b)  1. Paddy can trap only 1% of the sun’s energy falling on them. 1% of 10,000 J is 100 J, so  paddy have 100 J of energy available in them as food.  

2. Paddy is eaten up by mice. Now according to the 10% law, 10% of 100 J is 10 J of energy  which is available in mice.  

3. The mice will transfer 10% of its 10 J energy to the snake. Thus, the food energy  available to the snake will be 10% of 10 J, which is 1 J.  

4. 10% of 1 J will be transferred to hawk which will be 0.1 J.