Animals have to eat each other. There's a proliferation of life that leads to competition for scarce resources. When I look at nature, I see death more than I see life. Death is the necessity that makes life possible. But it's not.
Nature does get out of balance, even without humans making things worse.
Your essay expresses a deep concern for animals that seems compatible with the views of those concerned with the rights of animals. They want to protect animals from us. I think that that is a wrong way of contextualizing the issue. Humans are involved in the life of almost every animal on this planet in one way or another, and you can't wish that fact away. So I think we have to think of humans and animals in terms of a partnership, not in terms of protecting animals from humans.