The trophic level is the position in which an organism occupies the food chain. The organism faces two fates: What will eat them and what will they eat. It is a cycle in the ecosystem. Everything is a prey and everything is a predator, just at different degrees. A fish eats shrimp and other crustaceans, but seals eat the fish. It is a continuing cycle throughout the ocean blue. There is such a diverse amount of prey to feed on that losing one species of prey will not ruin the entire ecosystem. No one predator is subject to to one species of prey. The predator has adapted to consuming numerous types of prey because they know that that prey wont be around forever. Its almost like the food we eat. You don't want pizza every night right? you get sick of it. Well its the same thing in the ocean except with sea creatures.
The food chain or the trophic levels are occupied by numerous species of sea life. At the first level and second lie the plants like zooplankton and phytplankton. The second level contains the zooplankton because it eats the phytoplanktobn. In the trophic levels anything below you eats you. So the third level is the crustaceans, and below them lie the fish, who eat the crustaceans. The fifth level lies all the other animals that swim around the ocean, they eat anything above them depending on the animal.
website: http://www.sciencedaily.com/articles/t/trophic_level.htm
picture: www.sciencelearn.org.nz
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