Question

A small population of mice is released into a meadow. Many but not all of the mice survive and reproduce, and this pattern continues for many generations of mice. According to Darwin's ideas about evolution, which of these conditions is necessary for natural selection to occur on the mouse population? A. Any mutations in the population do not affect the fitness of a mouse. B. The meadow provides unlimited resources to support the mice. C. Traits that affect the survival of the mice vary among individual mice. D. The environment of the meadow remains about the same from year to year.

Answer 1

C) option is correct

Explanation:

Natural selection as proposed by Darwin is a selection pressure which operates in a population and allow the best fitted genotype to survive in changing environmental conditions and eliminate the other genotype which are not fit

Causes of natural selection include: Genetic drift, mutation(changes allelic frequency) and sexual selection

In the given example, condition necessary for natural selection to occur on the mouse population is traits that affect the survival of the mice vary among individual mice, in this condition superior genotype will get the opportunity to reproduce and inferior genotype does not get opportunity to reproduce thus their genotype in population does not increase rapidly and hence they become eliminated leading to genetic drift