Food Chain & Food Web Builder
Drag plants and animals onto the canvas, connect who eats whom and watch trophic levels, mistakes, food chains and the 10% energy pyramid update instantly.
A food chain shows how energy passes from one organism to the next, with every arrow pointing from the food to the eater: Grass → Grasshopper → Frog → Snake → Eagle. Only about 10% of the energy at each trophic level reaches the next, which is why food chains rarely have more than four or five levels.
Selected
Checks
Mistakes and tips for your web. Click one to find it.
Food chains in your web
Every path from a producer to a top consumer.
Energy pyramid (10% rule)
Follow the energy through an ecosystem
Every arrow in a food chain points from the food to the eater — the direction in which energy flows. Build chains and webs and the tool checks your science as you go.
Add organisms
Pick plants, animals and decomposers from the library — filter by type or habitat.
Connect them
Choose Connect, click the food first, then the animal that eats it. Keep clicking to extend the chain.
Read the levels
Trophic levels, colours, food-chain counts and mistake checks update automatically.
See the energy
The pyramid shows how only about 10% of energy passes to the next level. Save or download your web.
Producers, consumers, decomposers
- Producers (green plants, algae) make food by photosynthesis — always level 1.
- Herbivores eat plants (primary consumers, level 2); carnivores eat animals; omnivores eat both.
- Decomposers (fungi, bacteria) break down dead plants and animals and return nutrients to the soil.
The 10 percent law
Only about 10% of the energy at one trophic level reaches the next; the rest is used for life processes and lost as heat.
10,000 kJ → 1,000 → 100 → 10 kJ
That is why most food chains have only 3–5 levels.
Chain vs web
A food chain is one straight path: Grass → Grasshopper → Frog → Snake → Eagle. In nature animals eat many things, so chains join into a food web. An animal can sit at more than one trophic level in a web — a snake that eats a mouse is at level 3, but at level 4 when it eats a frog.
Food Chain & Food Web Builder — your questions
What is a food chain and which way do the arrows point?
A food chain is a single path showing how energy passes from one organism to the next, such as Grass → Grasshopper → Frog → Snake → Eagle. Each arrow points from the food to the eater, in the direction the energy flows. Drawing the arrow the other way round is the most common mistake in diagrams.
What is the difference between a food chain and a food web?
A food chain is one straight path. In nature most animals eat several different things, so many chains cross and join into a food web. In a web one animal can sit at more than one trophic level — a snake eating a mouse is at level 3, but at level 4 when it eats a frog that ate an insect.
What is the 10 percent law of energy transfer?
Only about 10% of the energy stored at one trophic level is passed on to the next; the rest is used for the organism's own life processes and lost as heat. So 10,000 kJ in the producers leaves 1,000 kJ for herbivores, 100 kJ for the next level and just 10 kJ after that — which limits chains to three to five levels.
What are producers, consumers and decomposers?
Producers are green plants and algae that make their own food by photosynthesis, and they always form trophic level 1. Consumers eat other organisms: herbivores are primary consumers, carnivores eat animals, and omnivores eat both. Decomposers such as fungi and bacteria break down dead matter and return nutrients to the soil.
What are trophic levels?
A trophic level is a feeding step in a food chain. Producers are level 1, herbivores or primary consumers are level 2, the carnivores that eat them are level 3, and top predators come next. Counting levels tells you how much of the original energy is left, since only about a tenth survives each step.
What is biomagnification?
Harmful chemicals such as pesticides are not broken down or excreted easily, so they build up in the body at each step of a food chain. Their concentration increases level by level, which is why top predators such as eagles and big fish carry the highest amounts. This increase is called biological magnification.
Can you give an example of a food chain in a forest?
In an Indian forest a typical chain runs Grass → Deer → Tiger, with the tiger as the top carnivore. In a grassland it is Grass → Grasshopper → Frog → Snake → Eagle, and in a pond Algae → Small fish → Big fish → Kingfisher. Every chain begins with a producer, because only plants can capture the Sun's energy.