Habitats and food chains
Biology · Key Stage 1 · The School
Suited to the place
A polar bear has thick fat and white fur. A camel stores fat in a hump and can close its nostrils against sand. Each animal has features that suit its habitat. That is called ADAPTATION. Swap the two animals over and neither one survives. So those features are not decoration. They are the reason the animal lives there.
Arrows show where energy goes
Grass → rabbit → fox. The arrow means is eaten by. It points the way the ENERGY travels. Drawing the arrows backwards is the classic mistake. Every chain starts with a producer. That is a plant, making food from light. Everything after it is a consumer.
Remove one link
Take away the rabbits. Now the foxes have less to eat, so fox numbers fall. And the grass grows thicker. Now take away the grass instead. Everything above it collapses. Food chains show why one change ripples through a habitat. They also show why protecting a habitat means protecting the whole chain. It is not enough to protect one favourite animal.
This time start with no foxes at all. Nothing is left to eat the rabbits. Rabbit numbers rise fast. There are soon far too many rabbits for the grass to feed. The rabbits eat the grass right down to bare soil. Then the rabbits run short of food too, and their numbers fall as well. Taking away the top of the chain caused just as much trouble as taking away the bottom. Every single link matters, whichever one is removed.