Download Antarctic food thought game cards

Food for thought…
Antarctic Food Web
Photo credit: Will Reid
Notes for teachers:
Food for thought… is an interactive food webs game, designed to give pupils an appreciation for the fact
that every organism living in a community is interconnected through feeding relationships.
Split the class in two and hand a double sided print-out of each of the following organism cards to half of
the class. The other half will be responsible for helping to construct the food web, based on the ‘key facts’
printed on the reverse of the picture cards. This role can be reversed by using another one of our food for
thought… packs downloadable from the website.
You will also need a hole puncher, for use where an
treasury tags to hold the food web together.
is indicated, and some strips of wool attached to
Get pupils to think about which organisms are producers, primary consumers, secondary consumers and
top predators to start them off. You can also use the bacteria card if you wish to symbolise decomposition
of permanent, sea living organisms in the food web. A guide of what the finished food web should look like
is below:
SUN
SEA BIRDS
PENGUINS
ALGAE
BALEEN WHALE
KRILL
FISH
BACTERIA
SEALS
SQUID
KILLER WHALE
Scenario cards are provided, as printable documents, of events that would affect organisms in the food
web. The pupil holding the organism that is affected sits down symbolising their removal from the food
web. Feeding connections to this organism are severed and the effect of its removal on other organisms
similarly indicated.
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This activity has sustainable development implications, by considering the impacts
Of humans on the marine environment and possible ways of managing this.
Seals
Photo credit: Paul Dunford
Key Facts:
Feeds on land and in the sea.
Carnivores that hunt and kill their
prey.
Algae
Photo credit: Gordon Beakes, Newcastle University
Key Facts:
Tiny marine plants that float around on the
waters surface and grow on the underside of
sea ice.
Producers that make their own energy using
the process of photosynthesis.
Sun
Key Facts:
The primary source of energy for
most food webs on the planet.
Used by producers to make
energy through the process of
photosynthesis.
Killer Whales
Photo credit: Tim Edgell
Key Facts:
Top predators that migrate through the
Antarctic to feed in rich waters.
Catch large fish and other animals found in
the water.
Too big to be eaten until they have
died.
Bacteria
Photo credit: Gordon Beakes, Newcastle University
Key Facts:
Microscopic organisms.
Break down dead plants and
animals to release nutrients back
into the water column.
Squid
Photo credit: NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Centre
Key Facts:
Secondary consumers that feed by
catching krill in their sticky
tentacles.
Squid are actually related to
marine snails!
Krill
Key Facts:
The most important organism in the
Antarctic food web.
Primary consumers that graze on
algae, which grows on the underside
of sea ice.
Seabirds
Photo credit: Paul Dunford
Key Facts:
Antarctic seabirds are serious
carnivores!
Feed by diving down into the
water column to catch their prey.
Baleen Whales
Photo credit: Wiep Klaas Smits
Key Facts:
Have huge sieves in their mouths to filter
out krill and other zooplankton from the
water column.
Generally too large to be eaten until they
have died.
Penguins
Photo credit: Paul Dunford
Key Facts:
Flightless birds whose wings have
adapted to flippers to help them swim
through the water.
Secondary consumers that feed by
diving down into the water column at
speed to catch their prey.
Antarctic fish
Photo credit: www.pacesaros.com
Key Facts:
Secondary consumers, but are hunted
by top predators that live in the
Antarctic seas.
The fish pictured is a Scotia Sea ice
fish, specially adapted to life in freezing
cold waters.