15 Examples of Heterotrophic Organisms

The heterotrophic organisms are those who must transform the organic material of others living beings to acquire the nutrients and energy necessary to survive. For example: fish, goats, carnivorous plants. They differ from autotrophic organisms, capable of synthesizing the substances necessary for their growth and survival from inorganic materials.

This type of feeding requires the prior presence of organic matter to consume and convert into its own and is common to all members of the animal Kingdom, the mushrooms, protozoa, most of the bacteria and the arches. The plants and phytocellular organisms are, instead, autotrophs. And there are organisms capable of both feeding methods, called mixtotrophs.

The life of heterotrophic organisms, then, will be conditioned by organic matter consumption (alive or dead, as the case may be) and for this they have various metabolisms capable of extracting nutrients of energy or structural value (lipids, protein, carbohydrates) that will later integrate their own bodies, and dispose of the rest through some system of excretion. They are, to that extent, the great transformers of organic matter.

Examples of heterotrophic organisms

1. Goats, cows and ruminant animals. On an exclusively vegetarian diet, these animals extract from plants all the organic content necessary to survive and build their own tissues, which serve as sustenance for the predators.
2. Lions, tigers, big cat predators. The great meat eaters of the animal kingdom require hunting and devouring other animals, usually the big ones. herbivores that match your habitats, in order to consume the nutrients needed to kick start your own metabolism.
3. Fungi and decomposers fungi kingdom. Fungi, despite being immobile like plants, do not share with them the photosynthesis capacity that allows to convert sunlight into energy, so they must decompose and absorb previous organic matter, either from humus in decomposition of soils in woods, from the humid and enclosed parts of the skin of a host, or from the excrements of other living beings, depending on the type of fungus (decomposer, parasite, etc.).
4. Fish and eels and rays. Predators of the underwater animal kingdom, organized into various possible Trophic chains in which, as the proverb says, there is always a bigger fish. The truth is that they must consume other smaller living beings to assimilate the molecular and caloric content of their bodies (usually they digest them whole) and thus keep their own going.
5. Whales and others sea ​​mammals. Some of these marine mammals, like the dolphin, prey on small fish like the sardine; others feed on microscopic plankton filtering from the waters, such as whales. In both cases, they require the consumption and digestion of these living beings to extract the necessary nutrients for life.
6. Most of the bacteria. The most abundant organisms on the planet, of which approximately 50% are known, are the great transformers of the matter of the planet. Many of them are autotrophic, capable of photosynthesis or from chemosynthesis, but the vast majority are dedicated to the processing of external organic substances, either parasitizing other living beings or decomposing dead organic matter.
7. Carnivorous plants. Nicknamed this way because they have organs specifically adapted to the digestion of small insects that, attracted by the sweetness of their aromas (or often because they smell like decomposing meat), then they are captured and slowly digested to provide the plant with organic material supplementary.
8. All kinds of birds. Whether they eat insects and worms, tree fruits or leaves, flower nectar, fish and small rodents, or other Smaller birds, birds as a whole require the ingestion and assimilation of matter from other living beings to be able to keep up with lifetime.
9. Elephants, rhinos, hippos. These large African mammals, despite their size, feed on tons and tons of vegetables, seeds, shrubs, and bark. All this rich in organic matter to assimilate and that nourishes the composition of their voluminous quadruped bodies.
10. Protozoa. Their name means "first animal" and it is because they are single-celled organisms Y eukaryotes, but in turn predators or detritivores, that is, heterotrophs (although in some cases they can be mixotrophic or partially autotrophic). A good example of its way of nourishing itself is the amoeba (or amoeba), which phagocytes cells of other types, including other protozoa, and after isolating them inside, dissolves them and assimilates the cellular content of the prey into its body.
11. Earthworms, scale bugs, and other detritivores. They are called "detritivores" because they ingest detritus, that is, residues or waste from other biotic processes, such as rotten wood, organic remains of dead animals, etc. These animals are vital to the energy transmission chain in the trophic pyramids and are, of course, heterotrophs.
12. Mice, marmots and rodents in general. With a wide and varied diet, which can range from eggs and small lizards to pieces of cardboard or wood, rodents are all heterotrophs as they depend on the intake of these materials, alive or not, to be able to nourish the own body.
13. Octopus, mollusks and bivalves. Other marine inhabitants that tend to either prey crustaceans or even smaller mollusks, or simply filtering plankton from the waters through a barb system. Either way, they are beings in need of organic matter to live and provided with metabolisms adapted to their specific diet.
14. Spiders, scorpions and arachnids. The great predators of the world of arthropods, are the arachnids: hunters and eaters of other vegetarian insects or hunters in turn, are equipped with the entire arsenal necessary to rape or trap their prey and then sip their juices to feed themselves, leaving behind an empty shell and sometimes neither even that.
15. The man. The largest omnivore, capable of feeding on most animal or plant species that it knows and cultivates in captivity, as well as plants and vegetables, and even food produced in an industrial way from organic substances, is the closest example of heterotrophic feeding that have.

Follow with: