Post-Blob, California’s kelp crisis isn’t going away

Post-Blob, California’s Kelp Crisis Isn’t Going Away

Off Fort Bragg, in a murky cove where abalone divers once hunted, a square meter of seafloor held about 120 purple urchins. For kelp to return, that number has to drop to two. The divers who now cull them with rock hammers needed three years, dozens of volunteers, and more than 150,000 smashed urchins to clear a single acre.

A decade after the Blob’s marine heat wave and the sea star die-off, Northern California has lost 95 percent of its bull kelp, and recovery has been scarce. Restoration works where money flows, but the money isn’t flowing at the scale of the problem. The urchins aren’t the villains. We are, for heating the ocean, and the bill is coming due.

Sources: Mongabay