APRIL ADVENTURER- SCIENCE
Section 1
Read each question carefully. Choose the most suitable answer.
1. Which of the following is the predator of antelopes?
A. Lion
B. Elephant
C. Zebra
D. Vulture
2. Which of the following is a prey of lions?
A. Dung beetle
B. Antelope
C. Golden orb spider
D. Grass
3.
Which one of the following is NOT a habitat?
A. A grassland.
B. The dung beetle.
C. A rotting log.
D. The rainforest floor.
4. Vultures are big birds that are known as scavengers? This means they
A. kill their prey like the antelopes.
B. make their own food in sunlight.
C. eat the remains of other animals.
D. hunt their food just like lions .
5.
The antelope grazes on the grass in the park. It is an example of a _________.
A. predator
B. carnivore
C. herbivore
D. scavenger
6.
Which one of the following shows a correct food chain?
A. Lion
zebra
grass
B. Grass
lion
antelope
C. Lion
grass
zebra
D. Grass
antelope
lion
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Section 1
7. The dung beetle is important in the grassland habitat of Gorongosa because it
__________.
A. kills the grass on the plains.
B. breaks down antelopes’ waste.
C. rolls the antelope dung.
D. reduces the population of lions.
8. An ecosystem refers to ___________.
A. the physical environment in which plants or animals can be found.
B. the living things, plants and animals, in a particular area
C. the living and nonliving things in an area and their interactions.
D. the relationship between plants and animals living in the same area.
9. A carnivore is an animal that ____________.
A. eats plants only.
B. makes their own food.
C. eats both plants and animals.
D. eats other animals.
10.
Which one of the following graphs best illustrates what would happen to a
population of antelopes if the population of lions was suddenly wiped out?
Number of
antelopes
2
Section 2
Answer the questions in the spaces provided.
11
The article “Back to Life” in the National Geographic Explorer Adventurer magazine
mentions various different organisms. State one example of the organisms from the
article that represents each category below.
Animals
Mammals
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Birds
Reptiles
Amphibians
Insects
These are examples of animals that are present in an ecosystem.
a. What type of ecosystem do these organism most likely belong to?
_____________________________________________________________________
b. Construct a food web in the box below with at least four of the organisms mentioned in
the diagram above.
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c. There are an estimated 30,000 lions remaining in all of Africa, down from perhaps
200,000 as recently as the 1970s. What are the common causes of the decrease in the
population of lions?
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
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Answer Key
Section 1
1
A . Lion
Tip: A predator is an animal that kills and eats other animals. Lions are predators, killing
animals like antelopes and zebras that feed on plants. Elephants and zebras are
herbivores, that is, they feed on plants. Vultures, although they are carnivores or meateating like lions, do not kill for their food. They feed on the leftovers of the lion’s kill.
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B. Antelope
Tip: A prey is an animal that is eaten by other animals. Herbivores or plant-eating animals
such as the antelopes, are eaten by carnivores or meat-eating animals like lions.
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B. Dung beetle
Tip: A habitat is an environment where a plant or animal lives. Habitats can be vast areas
like grassland, meadow, rainforest or as small as the rotting log in your garden or forest.
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C. eats the remains of other animals
Tip: Animals like vultures, hyenas and jackals are both scavengers and hunters. As
scavengers they feed off the remains of other animals that have died or were killed by
other predators like the lion.
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C. herbivore
Tip: A herbivore is an animal that is adapted to eat plants. Animals like antelopes, zebras,
elephants, giraffes are herbivores. They are the first level or primary consumers.
6 D. Grass
antelope
lion
Tip: A food chain only follows just one path as animals find food. For example, a hawk eats
a snake, which has eaten a frog, which has eaten a grasshopper, which has eaten grass. A
food chain starts from plants which are producers (organisms that have chlorophyll which
can trap the sun’s energy to make food by the process called photosynthesis). Several
interconnecting food chains make a food web.
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B. breaks down antelope’s wastes.
Tip: Dung beetles are insects that feed partly or exclusively on dung or faeces of animals,
especially herbivores and omnivores. The “rollers” roll the dung into round balls burying
them in their brooding chambers in the ground. The female beetle lays its eggs in the dung
ball and the larvae that hatch out have a ready food source. Other dung beetles are
tunnellers, burying the dung wherever they find it and a third group are the dwellers,
preferring to simply live in the dung.
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C. the living and non-living things in an area and their interactions
Tip: An ecosystem consists of the living and non-living things in an area and their
interactions.
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D. eats other animals
Tip: “Carnivore” means meat or flesh eater. A carnivore is an organism that gets its energy
and nutrients from a diet consisting mainly of animal tissue whether through predation or
scavenging.
10 B.
Tip: Graph B shows the population of antelopes increasing and then decreasing. Since
lions are predators of antelopes, when the population of lions is suddenly wiped out, the
population of antelopes will have a better chance to survive to reproduce. Eventually
though, the population will decrease as a result of deaths due to competition for food or
predation by other predators. Graphs C and D show the population of antelopes decreasing
and Graph A has the population of antelopes increasing indefinitely.
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Answer Key
Section 2
11 Mammals : lions, antelopes, zebras, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, elephants, buffaloes,
jackals, hyenas
Birds: vultures
Reptiles: crocodiles
Amphibians: frogs
Insects: dung beetles, praying mantis
12 a. A grassland. b. grass
vulture
antelope
lion
zebra
OR
vulture
grass
antelope
grass
antelope
OR
lion
lion
zebra
c. The numbers of lions have decreased as human population has expanded into lion habitat,
reduced the numbers of prey animals that lions need to live, and killed lions in order to protect
livestock and human lives. In addition, lions are hunted as a black market for lion bones and
other parts has sprung up in China and other Asian countries.
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