By Sydney Cohen

What makes something “balanced”? The term is thrown around a lot in discussions about the environment, but what does it really mean? Ecological balance is achieved when there are no negative effects on the planet. This means that every organism has to have enough resources available for survival and reproduction.

The goal of an ecological balance is to maintain as many species as possible while preventing any from going extinct. Humans need to take care of the natural world they live in by recycling more, using less water and electricity, and reducing pollution which harms wildlife habitats.

The Ecological Balance of Nature

The balance of nature proposes that ecological systems are usually in a stable equilibrium. The theory says that a small change (the size of a particular population) will be corrected by negative feedback. The theory has been used to describe the relationship between ecosystems, the atmosphere, and the world’s weather. It is often depicted as easily disturbed and delicate, while other times portrayed as powerful enough to correct imbalances by itself. The concept is described as “normative”, as well as teleological. However, it has been largely discredited by scientists working in ecology, as it has found that constant disturbances leading to chaotic and dynamic changes are the norm in nature.

Ecological balance involves the relations and interdependencies between living things and their (nonliving) environments. This includes relations between living organisms and non-living environments.

One Species Can Affect The Ecological Balance

All species in an ecosystem each play an important role in keeping the ecosystem running smoothly. You can think of ecosystems like a house of cards, with each card representing a different species. Even if an ecosystem is balanced, that doesn’t mean that no changes ever occur.

The good news is that an ecosystem will typically recover back to a balanced state after a disturbance occurs, but there will always be a disturbance to the ecosystem, like a windstorm or a predator being hunted, a drought reducing the availability of food resources. A disturbance can cause a chain reaction in the entire ecosystem, not just individuals, like removing one species.