Question

What problem will arise if there is either an increase or decrease in the number of any component of a food chain or food web?

Answer 1

A food chain can be explained as a linear network of links in a food web. The food chain in any ecosystem starts from producer organisms and ends at top predator species. A food chain shows the relations between each organism by the food they eat.

Complete answer:
In an ecosystem, there are different types of organisms present. The organisms get energy from the food. All the organisms are not capable of producing food and they depend on the plants or the other animals for food.
A food chain is a linear order of events in an ecosystem. In the chain, one organism becomes the food of another organism, and after that those organisms are further eaten by larger organisms. A food chain can be described as the flow of nutrients and energy that occurs from one organism to another at different trophic levels. Producers, consumers, and decomposers are the major three components of a food chain or food web.
In a food chain, producers produce food and they are eaten by consumers. There are generally two types of consumers; primary and secondary consumers where primary consumers are eaten by secondary consumers and eventually, they are eaten by apex predators.
If there is either an increase or decrease in the number of any component of a food chain or food web, there will create an imbalance of organisms in the food chain or food web. When a particular component gets decreased in number, the organisms that eat the components as food will also decrease in number. As an example, if the number of tigers gets increased, the number of deer would decrease and a decrease in the number of deer will cause the starvation of tigers, and that leads to dying afterward and the number of tigers will reduce. When the number of tigers reduces, the number of deer would increase. Further, the deer would eat all the grass and which causes a reduction of grass and leads to starvation of deer and then to death.
Therefore, it is very important to maintain the balance of the food chain or web to avoid such situations.

Note: A food chain shows a linear sequence between the different components of the ecosystem. Producers, primary and secondary consumers, and decomposers are the main component of a food chain or food web. A food chain begins with the producers that are able to produce food and later eaten by the primary consumers. Then primary consumers are eaten by secondary consumers and further, they are destroyed by decomposers. Thus energy is transferred step by step. If there is either an increase or decrease in the number of any component of a food chain or food web then there will be an imbalance in the food chain.