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All Units | > | Unit 13 - Adaptation | > | Investigation 1 - Populations | > | Thinking About the Question |
What keeps populations stable?
What keeps populations stable?
In the natural world, populations of animals and plants go up and down with changing environmental conditions. For example, the squirrel population changes from year to year depending on the availability of nuts, which in turn may depend on rainfall or temperatures.
Over time, however, many populations are relatively stable. They don't grow forever, and they don't disappear. For instance, the squirrel population in an area might fluctuate from year to year between 1000 and 4000, but it would rarely be more or less than this.
Take the example of deer in a forested part of the country. List some of the factors that you think could affect the size of the deer population from year to year.