Read the story below and match each organism mentioned with one of the five categories below. You may also wish to make a diagram of the entire food web. On a bright spring day the sun shines onto the forest floor and warms the water in the nearby swamp. The warm weather and the moist soil cause plants to sprout. In the woods, the old oak trees unfold their new leaves, and within a matter of days the leaves begin to produce food by photosynthesis.
Mushrooms pop up around rotting logs, and beetle larvae feast on the fungus and decayed wood.
Along the edge of the swamp, wild irises begin to emerge from the still water. The surface of the dark, swamp water is soon coated with a green layer of tiny duckweed plants. Soon the spring warmth triggers the emergence of linden looper caterpillar eggs, and these young caterpillars crawl onto the tender oak leaves and begin feeding. In the swamp, the cypress and water tupelo have begun to produce new leaves, all the better to hide the nest of bright yellow prothonotary warblers . The hungry babies are fed a constant diet of looper caterpillars and any other insects the parents can find.