Loss of predators in the food chain can alter the ecosystem

[SouthernStar]

WebEarthOnline is right, the sick/diseased/mutated animals that are weak die due to predators, but the healthy ones live long enough to get the chance to breed, and will breed with another strong herd member. They will then have healthy offspring, thus keeping a healthy herd. Maybe that's why we humans have SO many diseases. There's really almost no chance to die. Either way, if predators died, the diseased animals would breed with other diseased animals, and the healthy ones. So the herd will be weaker, and gradually get more and more prone to death and eventually drop in population. So then the grass has a chance to grow like no tomorrow.

[Quagga]

However, the sick animal could have infected numerous others even before it would have been taken down. Simple contact, the air they breath, and water sources... Entire herds would have gotten sick so easily. The predators would have helped to rid of some of these sick animals, but considering how it spread, I simply cannot think that they would have been able to help that much.

[SouthernStar]

Yes, but a healthy animal could survive a normal sickness, while a weak one would die. An epidemic sickness just kills everything.


Predator=Kills weak animals
Sickness=Kills weak animals
Weak animals=Die
Healthy animals=Make more healthy animals

[Alrai]

Wildebeest. A human-introduced disease, rinderpest, almost wiped out wildebeest in parts of Africa, which in turn led to a build-up of woody vegetation, resulting in devastating wildfires. When the disease was eradicated with a vaccine, the native grasslands returned and fires calmed.

This particular situation does not seem to involve a loss of predators in the food chain much at all. It was most notably the disease that brought the wildebeest population down, and thus with less wildebeest, thanks to the disease, the woody vegetation grew, resulting in more fires. Predators do not seem to be a very important variable in this situation. Simply, the disease was the cause, not the predators. Is that what you all seem so intrigued by? I honestly just assumed that after reading the two sentences, ha.

[Scarikas]

Where's an epic spore space captain when you need one.