Possibly unappealing at the surface, kelp forests offer an array of live and services that the world simply cannot live without… Let’s dive in!
🌿 Where can you find kelp forests? 🌿 What type of life do they support? 🌿 Why are they threatened? 🌿 How can you help?
Kelp forests are found in polar and temperate waters, and cover 25% of the world’s coastlines! They harbour life from the smallest of creatures to larger animals, like sea otters, seals, and sharks. Kelp forests also provide critical ecosystem services. Thank you, kelp!!
By watching our latest video, you’ll learn all this and MORE, including the threat of voracious sea urchins that are causing mass loss of kelp. There is plenty that can be done to change the fate of the world’s kelp forests, so tune in and find out how YOU can help protect such a vital ecosystem.
From above, this ecosystem may look unalluring,
but dive down into this magical world and you will be amazed.
Kelp forests are found all around the globe,
covering 25% of the world's coastlines in both temperate and polar regions.
Towering to heights of up to 40 meters, kelp provides the architecture for an entire community.
Just like a regular forest, organisms live in the different layers of this ecosystem.
Kelp anchors, known as holdfasts, along with blades,
host numerous creatures from worms and sponges to fish, birds and marine mammals.
The understory bursts with sea urchins, abalones, starfish and snails.
Grazers chomp their way through the understory.
Others feast on the creatures living on the kelp blades.
Predators weave their way in and out of the fronds, searching for prey.
Kelp is the foundation species for this entire ecosystem.
But perhaps more importantly, kelp plays a pivotal role in combating climate change.
It grows up to half a meter a day, rapidly sequestering carbon from the atmosphere,
whilst locally mitigating ocean acidification and deoxygenation.
Globally, kelp forests contribute billions of dollars
through harvesting, fisheries, tourism, climate regulation and shoreline protection.
But worldwide, they're in serious decline.
Local stresses like coastal pollution combined with ocean warming are largely to blame.
95% of Tasmania's kelp forests have already been lost.
Along the west coast of America, a marine heatwave combined with disease
wiped out sea stars, which predate purple sea urchins.
The urchin population exploded, decimating kelp forests
and transforming the seascape into an urchin barren.
Even when there is no kelp left, they can slow the metabolism to a hibernation-like state
and live for another 50 years, leaving a lasting effect on a crucial ecosystem.
But nature can recover when people fight back.
In areas like California, scientists, divers and surfers
are joining forces in a momentous effort to cull urchins by hand.
Once removed, work is being done to reintroduce grazers and natural predators
like sea otters and rock lobsters to help keep urchin numbers down.
Given the chance, kelp can regenerate and eventually return to this.
An underwater oasis, teeming with life.
You too can help support kelp forests by donating to kelp conservation programs
or volunteering and participating in citizen science projects.
So why not become an urchin diver and help give kelp forests a fighting chance?
