As a result of this incredible growth, kelp forests can develop very quickly in areas that they did not previously exist. Kelp thrives in cold, nutrient-rich waters.
Generally speaking, kelps live further from the tropics than coral reefs , mangrove forests , and warm-water seagrass beds , so kelp forests do not overlap with those systems. Like those systems, though, kelp forests provide important three-dimensional, underwater habitat that is home to hundreds or thousands of species of invertebrates, fishes, and other algae. Some species aggregate and spawn in kelp forests or utilize these areas as juvenile nursery habitat.
Large predatory species of sharks and marine mammals are known to hunt in the long corridors that form in kelp forests between rows of individual plants. Though kelp forests are important ecosystems wherever they occur, they are more dynamic than the other systems mentioned above. In other words, they can disappear and reappear based on the oceanographic conditions and the population sizes of their primary herbivores. In a day trial, an experimental triangular-shaped structure of PVC pipes moored to a solar-powered buoy, called a kelp elevator , lowered seaweed fastened to it to depths of feet at night to absorb cold-water nutrients.
In the morning, the elevator returned the kelp to the sunlit surface. Large-scale offshore kelp farming could amplify a crucial function of kelp ecosystems: carbon sequestration. In a study , scientists found that farming just 3. And the research into kelp reproduction could help develop strains suitable for regrowing coastal kelp forests. And so Burdick and her colleagues have been seeding the abalone in restored kelp forests like this one.
Last November, the Foundation and its partners placed 3, white abalone in restored kelp forests and are planning to release to more this fall. The goal is to create a network of kelp refuges that can seed other areas and to begin monitoring the coastline for changes in kelp cover.
All rights reserved. Science News. Can they be saved? Marine life in a kelp forest on Cortes Bank, California. Kelp forests are suffering from warming oceans and out-of-balance ecosystems. Share Tweet Email. Why it's so hard to treat pain in infants. This wild African cat has adapted to life in a big city. Animals Wild Cities This wild African cat has adapted to life in a big city Caracals have learned to hunt around the urban edges of Cape Town, though the predator faces many threats, such as getting hit by cars.
Unlike a redwood forest, kelp is found in nutrient-rich, cold clear water usually on the western coasts of continents. One of the places kelp forests can be found is long the coast of California in Channel Islands National Park. Kelp looks like a tree, but it is a large brown algae. Kelp is known for its size, it can grow up from the ocean floor and reach about feet in length and grow as fast as 1.
Kelp does not have roots. Instead it secured by holdfasts to a rocky seafloor. It will grow as deep as light is available for photosynthesis. Visit Elkhorn Slough's real-time Otter Cam. Home Ocean Facts What is a kelp forest? What is a kelp forest? Kelp forests provide food and shelter for thousands of species. Search Our Facts.
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