In a mountain region, tigers eat wild pigs, and wild pigs eat worms. in the last 5 years, the sizes of the populations have been stable, but recently the tiger population has increased. what will likely happen to the worm population?
The worm population will ...
a. Decrease. The larger tiger population will leave fewer energy storage molecules available in the ecosystem for the worm population, so there will be fewer births in the worm population.
b. Increase. The larger tiger population will lead to fewer wild pigs. The smaller wild pig population will need fewer energy storage molecules to reproduce, so they will eat fewer worms. This will lead to more births than deaths in the worm population.
c. Stay the same. Tigers do not eat worms, so the number of births and deaths in the worm population will stay the same.
d. Increase. An increase in the size of any population leads to an increase in the sizes of all other populations in an ecosystem.