2022年8月23日 · From the coast of Southern Africa to Southern Alaska, sea urchins and kelp coexist peacefully — until they don’t. In recent decades, more and more kelp forests have been razed by the hungry urchins. In these places, “urchin barrens” have replaced once lush and diverse ecosystems. “At its worst, it’s urchins as far as the eye can see.

2023年5月26日 · Unchecked populations of purple sea urchins are devouring California's iconic kelp forests, but pioneering scientists are working to put the ecosystem back in balance.

2021年3月31日 · Purple sea urchins have boomed off Northern California, destroying kelp forests that provide a crucial ecosystem. They're purple, spiky and voracious, and just off the West Coast, there are more...

2025年1月20日 · The best-known urchin predator in this region is the sea otter (Enhydra lutris), long recognized as a keystone species that drives top-down control on kelp forests through its diet [6]. However, their populations have greatly declined as of recent due to increased predation by killer whales, leading to large absences in their natural habitats ...

2024年10月14日 · In 2013, a large scale (70 hectare) kelp forest restoration experiment was conducted in a sea urchin barren that had been stable for 45 years. We used 200 tons of quicklime to eradicate the sea urchin population. Kelp recovered within a year in the lime-treated sites. Quickliming did not significantly affect the abundance of non-target species.

2022年6月29日 · A dramatic outbreak of kelp-eating sea urchins along the Central Coast of California in 2014, leading to a significant reduction in the region’s kelp forests, was driven primarily by the emergence of sea urchins from their hiding places rather than an increase in the urchin population.

2021年10月7日 · More than 95 percent of California’s coastal kelp forests have been killed by an explosion of purple sea urchins. Commercial divers like Byron Koehler and Gary Trumper have been hired to help control the purple urchin population.

2021年4月18日 · Since 2014, bull kelp forests in northern California have declined due to a combination of extreme warm water events (a marine heat wave known as the “Blob” and an El Niño) and dramatic increases in native purple sea urchin populations, which feed on kelp.

2024年2月7日 · Here we examine the community-wide consequences of kelp deforestation along the central coast of California, where outbreaks of purple sea urchin (Strongylocentrotus purpuratus) grazers shifted a once expansive kelp forest to a mosaic landscape of sea urchin barrens interspersed with remnant patches of kelp . The purpose of this study was to ...

2023年2月2日 · The long-spined sea urchin is bad news for Tasmanian sea life as the species can quickly nibble swaying kelp forests to bald rocks, forming underwater moonscapes known as urchin barrens. Seaweed is important food and habitat for the animals of a rocky reef, so when urchins create a barren it's akin to clear-felling a vibrant rainforest.