Whose diet requires the most land area to support it?

Question

a. a carnivore who eats only meat
b. a vegetarian who eats only plants
c. an omnivore who eats both plants and animals
d. a decomposer who eats dead plants and animals

Answer 1

a. a carnivore who eats only meat

Energy transfer between trophic levels are inefficient; you only retain about 10% of the energy from food you eat. The higher up on the food chain you are, the more you need to eat. Logically, a carnivore has to consume at least 10x as much as the prey.

Answer 2

A carnivore.

The reason is that the carnivore must eat an herbivore or omnivore at least every few days (well, except some snakes). The carnivore's territory must encompass sufficient land to support all of the herbivores the carnivore eats.

Answer 3

A carnivore eats animals that eat a lot of herbs, forbs, and grasses. Ergo, a lion that eats a buffalo will be eating the equivalent of a few hundred acres of grass.