How Animals Eat Their Food- Let's Explore Macroinvertebrate

Not all animals eat their food the same way. Animals that are big like elephants or as small as macroinvertebrates eat in a variety of different ways. Let’s look at how animals eat their food.

Wait! What is a macroinvertebrate? They are small organisms that don’t have spines and are large enough to see with your naked eye.

Here are some examples of macroinvertebrates:

Craneflies
Blackflies
Mayflies
Dragonfly
Snails
Flatworms

This set of explorations looks at how macroinvertebrates feed or eat.

How These Animals Eat Their Food

There are five ways that these animals eat their food. Let me walk you through each of them and share how you can set of how animals eat exploration stations for each one.

How to Eat Like a Predator

Predators like dragonflies have long mouthparts that extend. You can place pieces of a straw onto a tray or box top. Your children can use tongs or chopsticks to pick up the straws.

How to Eat Like a Collector

Collectors like craneflies tend to wiggle around until they find food. You can place a large bendy straw onto a tray or box top. Your children can wiggle the straw until they find and reach the straw sections.

Some collectors have net-like areas on their head. You can put a small strainer or net in a box or on a tray for children to use to collect straw sections.

How to Eat Like a Shredder

Animals like stoneflies are shredders.You will need to put small pieces of paper or old telephone book pages onto a tray for your children to shred. If you like you can put in leaves for them to shred or tear into small piece, just as a shredder would.

How to Eat Like a Scraper

The final way of eating is scraping. Scrapers like the mayfly scrape algae off objects they come across. Then they eat the algae. You will need to place a piece of scratch art paper and a stick onto a tray. Your children can randomly scratch a design onto the paper or draw bug onto the paper.