Monterey Bay researchers are studying kelp repopulation after recent warming events. Kelp spores and juvenile urchins are collected and kept in controlled samples to understand where larvae settle and how kelp can regrow. Baby kelp require cold, nutrient-rich water to mature into strong adult kelp structures. Coastal waters have already warmed by 3 to 4 degrees Fahrenheit, and a seventh marine heat wave in seven years threatens to interrupt recovery. A developing super El Niño could raise sea surface temperatures further, potentially causing kelp that survived earlier heat to decline and preventing new recovery. Warmer conditions could disrupt ecosystems, harm or kill local marine life, and shift species distributions northward.
"Baby kelp need cold, nutrient rich water to mature into tall, strong adult stipes. Giraldo Ospina worries that a massive, ongoing marine heat wave, which has already raised coastal waters by 3 to 4 degrees Fahrenheit, could disrupt efforts to regrow kelp forests vital to the Monterey Bay ecosystem, depending on how warm it becomes."
"She's part of ongoing research projects into how kelp species are repopulating the area. She collects kelp spores and tiny baby urchin from glass slides and rectangular broom heads anchored to the seafloor and stores them in plastic bags."
""It looks pretty green down there," Giraldo Ospina said. "We try to keep all the water in the bag because that's where larvae settle into the brushes and that might be what's floating in the water.""
"It's the seventh marine heat wave in seven years and could be amplified by a developing super El Niño, which has the potential to raise sea surface temperatures even higher. This combined influence could disrupt ecosystems, harm or kill local marine life and attract other species north."
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