Practice question

A limited predator carrying capacity prevents predator numbers from increasing without bound as prey become rare. If predator survival and reproduction depend strongly on the focal prey, declining prey reduces the resource base, causing predator decline before every prey individual can be removed. Refuges, handling constraints, territoriality, and alternative food webs may further permit persistence. This negative feedback can protect prey from extinction: low prey density supports fewer predators, reducing total predation pressure. Density-independent predator growth would remove that stabilizing response and could intensify prey loss. Mimicry may reduce capture probability for particular prey but is not the general condition described, while an absent prey population is already extinct. The statement is not an absolute law—predators introduced to naïve, spatially restricted prey can cause extinction, especially if predators are subsidized by alternative prey. In the intended single-resource system, however, resource-limited predator carrying capacity creates a numerical response that weakens predation as prey decline, favoring coexistence rather than complete elimination.