A population of lizards that originally had no predators lived on a small isolated island. Predators of the lizards were accidently introduced to the island from a visiting ship. The graph shows how the average leg length of the surviving lizards changed over time once the predator was introduced. Which statement could explain the graph above

Question

Giana Middleton

Biology

2 May, 13:23

A population of lizards that originally had no predators lived on a small isolated island. Predators of the lizards were accidently introduced to the island from a visiting ship. The graph shows how the average leg length of the surviving lizards changed over time once the predator was introduced. Which statement could explain the graph above

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Answers (1)

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Xiomara Shaffer · Answer 1

Lizards with longer legs can escape predators

Explanation:

On the island of lizards with no predators, any phenotype could survive since there was no selection pressure. Once a predator arrived on the island morphology became a selection pressure. This means that escaping a predator gave this individual a chance for survival. It also means that those that were not able to escape could not procreate and their genetic line was cut off or reduced. Survival of the fittest became the lizards with longer legs. These traits were passed on from the survivors.