Saprotroph

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A Saprotroph (or Saprobe) is an organism that gets its energy from non-living organic matter. This may be decaying pieces of plants or animals. This means that saprobes are heterotrophs. They are consumers in the food chain. Many fungi are saprobes. This is also true for many bacteria and protozoa. To put it simply, most dead organic matter is eventually broken down and used by bacteria and fungi.

There is also an older name, Saprophyte for these kinds of organisms. -phyte usually means plant. The problem with that name was that no embryophytes (land plants) are true saprotrophs. Bacteria and fungi are no longer considered plants either.