We explain what prey and predators are and how they differ. We also explain their characteristics and examples.
What are prey and predators?
When we talk about prey and predators, we are referring to one of the most common relationships between animals: the predation. It is a type of biological interaction in which an animal (the predator either predator) hunts and feeds on another (the prey) to survive.
A predator can also be prey from another larger than it, some species feeding on others in what is known as the trophic chain or food chain (sometimes represented in the form of a pyramid), whose balance keeps the organisms of a given ecosystem in balance.
So, the prey-predator relationship is essentialalso, for natural selection, extinguishing unfit species or forcing them to adapt to survive.
See also: Biology
Predators
Predators are animals evolutionarily conditioned for hunting.
They generally have very sensitive and fine-tuned senses (sight, smell, hearing, even touch) to detect their prey.
Also They have useful appendages to capture themseriously injure them or immobilize them, as the case may be.
These appendages They can be large sharp claws or serrated teethstingers with paralyzing venom, curved beaks for tearing flesh, etc.
Predators can be of two types:
- Generalists or polyphagous. Those capable of feeding on various types of prey, whether of different species or variants of the same, being able to compete more widely with other predators.
- Specialists or monophages. Those that tend to feed on a specific type or species of prey, thus having a more or less exclusive or limited niche and less competitiveness.
Dams
The prey can be of very different types. There is a tendency to think that only herbivores or detritus eaterswhich feed on plants or waste, play the role of prey in an ecosystem.
But Small and medium-sized predators are also usuallyserving as food for larger predators, escalating in size and complexity.
Types of predation
If predation is understood as the ability to feed on the body of another living being (heterotrophic nutrition), we will have four types of predation:
- Herbivore. The animal devours the tissue of plants, trees and other living beings of the plant kingdom, whether their leaves, bark, roots, etc., causing damage and possibly death.
- Carnivorous. The animal hunts other animals and consumes their meat, incorporating it into its body directly and nourishing itself from the chemical energy stored in its tissues.
- Parasitic. It is not exactly a form of predation, since the prey is kept alive, although the parasite that invades its body uses it as a direct food source (its tissues or cells) or indirectly (other living beings in its body).
Defenses against predators
Predation is not a gentle process, but a violent one, and prey do not participate in it voluntarily.
Thus, in the course of evolutionary competition, prey have incorporated and learned tools to defend themselves from their predators, such as:
- Chameleon skins to camouflage themselves with the environment and go unnoticed, or be confused with other unwanted species.
- Odoriferous or toxic glands capable of secreting poison, unpleasant or repellent substances.
- Armor and shells to resist the attack of the predator by isolating the vital organs.
- Strong muscles to fight or escape at full speed.
Why is predation important?
Predation It is key in the system of life.
It is the mechanism for the transmission of carbon from the most basic to the most complex forms of life, also allowing significant pressure (known as natural selection) to be exerted on species, based on their competition to survive and reproduce.
Charles Darwin discovered in the 19th century that this pressure is one of the most effective engines for evolution.
Predator-prey system
Both carnivorous predators and prey are immersed in a cycle or system that allows the transmission of carbon and nitrogenfundamental elements of life, among each other.
Herbivores, which obtain their nutrients from plant life, on the one hand have to feed constantly, since Plants are less rich in chemical energy than animal tissueand they also feed on substances that are difficult to assimilate.
Their main problem is how to incorporate the obtained nutrients into their body, which often requires the generation of hyper-specialized enzymes.
Instead, predators They obtain abundant calories from the meat of their preyin a way that is extremely easy to assimilate, but to do so they must first invest a variable amount of additional energy in the hunt.
This means that an exhausted predator will have very little chance of catching prey.
Are there differences between predator and predator?
There is no difference between the terms “predator” and “predator.” They’re synonyms.
Examples of predators
- Lions, panthers, pumas and other big cats.
- Crocodiles and alligators that surprise their prey when they go to drink water.
- Spiders, which use their webs to capture prey.
- Snakes and boas, which use poisonous bites or suffocating constriction to capture their prey.
- Eagles, hawks, owls and other good-sized birds of prey.
- The praying mantis, an insect so ferocious that it can feed on insects, small fish, small rodents or other mantises.
Examples of dams
Although virtually any animal can be prey to another, it is herbivorous animals that most frequently occupy this step:
- Oxen, wildebeest and other wild bovines.
- Caterpillars of various types, preyed upon by birds, rodents and insects.
- Moles, mice and other insectivorous rodents, hunted by birds of prey.
- Small fish that are eaten by larger fish.
Examples of predation
- Antelopes are large horned herbivores that African lions and Asian tigers chase, hunt and eat on a daily basis.
- In the sea there are microscopic animals called zooplankton, which are massively preyed upon by whales, filtering them from the water with their baleen.
- In the countryside, owls prey on any type of nocturnal rodent they can find: mice, rats, even weasels.
- Seals and sea lions in the cold waters of the Atlantic often fall prey to the sharp teeth of sharks, or the claws of polar bears.