Behavioral responses across a mosaic of ecosystem states restructure a sea otter–urchin trophic cascade. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences , 2021; 118 (11): e2012493118 DOI: 10. ...

Thanks to an abundance of prey (including an increase in mussels as well as urchins), the sea otter population increased substantially after 2014, from about 270 to about 432 sea otters in the ...

Northern sea otters, once hunted to the brink of extinction along Alaska's Panhandle, have made a spectacular comeback by gobbling some of the state's finest seafood — and fishermen are not ...

image: A southern sea otter with a purple sea urchin in Monterey Bay, California. view more Credit: Morgan Rector. Sea otters have long been recognized as a classic example of a keystone species ...

"We also had an urchin outbreak on the Central Coast, but not to the same extent as in the areas north of San Francisco." The research team soon saw the sea otters spring to action, eating nearly ...

The California Sea Urchin Commission and Commercial Fishermen of Santa Barbara sought to strip protections on the grounds that otter numbers and their range have increased since they were listed ...

Overhunting of the sea otter, one of urchins’ most significant predators, has allowed some urchin populations to clear cut vast tracts of kelp forest, drastically reducing the productivity and ...

Sea urchins dine on a reef in the Aleutian Islands. Urchins, which boomed after sea otters disappeared, destroyed many kelp forests on the reefs and are now eating the algae-filled reefs that have ...

These urchin-eating sea stars might be helping us reduce carbon levels. The 24-armed sunflower sea star is not a picky eater, which may makes it crucial to restoring kelp forests.