Science8 min read
Counting Fish With Sound: Acoustic Surveys Explained
How do you count fish you can't see? Acoustic surveys use sonar to turn echoes into biomass estimates. Here's how echosounders work — and their limits.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Ocean Science
Explainers on the physics, chemistry and biology of temperate seas — marine heatwaves, upwelling, holdfast biology, trophic cascades, eDNA.
213 articles
Science10 min read
The AMOC Explained: The Atlantic's Overturning Engine
How the Atlantic's great overturning circulation works, what the observations say about its strength, and why its slowing matters for climate and coasts.
Dr. Lena Fischer ·
Science10 min read
Annual or Perennial: How Kelp Life Strategies Shape the Forest
Some kelps live one season, others many years. What annual vs perennial life strategies mean for forest dynamics, storm recovery — and choosing restoration species.
Dr. Theo Nakamura ·
Science11 min read
Argo Floats: The Ocean's Global Thermometer Network
Nearly 4,000 drifting robots take the ocean's temperature from within. How Argo profiling floats work, what they measure, and why the data is free.
Dr. Lena Fischer ·
Science8 min read
Belt Transects and Quadrats: How Ecologists Count a Kelp Forest
Belt transects and quadrats turn a kelp forest into numbers: who lives where, at what density. How these classic survey methods work, and why they endure.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Science10 min read
Benthic-Pelagic Coupling: How the Seafloor and the Water Column Talk
Food produced in sunlit surface water rains down to feed the seafloor, and the seafloor recycles nutrients back up. How benthic-pelagic coupling runs a kelp forest.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Science8 min read
Why Diverse Kelp Forests Bounce Back: Biodiversity, Stability and Insurance
Diverse kelp forests ride out marine heatwaves that wipe out simple ones. Here's the ecology of the biodiversity–stability relationship — and how it guides restoration.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Science11 min read
Biofilms and Settlement Cues: How Larvae and Spores Choose a Home
A marine larva picks its lifelong address in minutes, guided by microbial slime and chemical whispers. How biofilms and settlement cues decide who settles where.
Dr. Theo Nakamura ·
Science9 min read
Bioluminescence: Why the Sea Lights Up at Night
Glowing waves, sparkling wakes and milky seas: the chemistry and ecology of bioluminescence, and how to see the ocean light up yourself.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Science12 min read
How Kelp Happened: The Deep Evolution of the Brown Algae
Kelp is not a plant — it is a brown alga built around a stolen red-algal plastid. Tracing 200 million years of stramenopile evolution that produced the forest.
Dr. Elias Brandt ·
Science9 min read
Holes in the Canopy: How Storm Gaps Reset Kelp Forests
Storms punch holes in kelp canopies, and those holes are where the next forest begins. The science of gap dynamics, light pulses and the patchwork reef.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Science11 min read
The Carbonate Buffer: How Seawater Resists — and Records — Acidification
Seawater carries a built-in shock absorber for acidity: the carbonate buffer. How it works, why it's wearing thin, and what it means for shell-builders and kelp.
Dr. Lena Fischer ·
Science9 min read
Feeding the Wrong Forest: How Coastal Eutrophication Crowns Turf Over Kelp
How nutrient pollution from land tips coastal reefs from kelp forest to turf algae, why the shift is so hard to reverse, and what actually brings the canopy back.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Science9 min read
Eutrophication on the Coast: When Too Much Food Sinks the Forest
Nutrient pollution feeds opportunistic algae that shade and smother kelp, while rotting blooms strip oxygen. How eutrophication degrades kelp coasts.
Dr. Theo Nakamura ·
Science12 min read
Reading Rocky Shores: The Geomorphology Beneath Every Kelp Forest
Shore platforms, reef relief and rock type decide where kelp can grow. How coastal geomorphology shapes forests — and why restoration starts with reading rock.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Science8 min read
Coastal Squeeze: Kelp Between Rising Seas and Hard Shores
As seas rise, coastal habitats migrate inland — unless seawalls block the way. How coastal squeeze threatens kelp forests and the intertidal zone, and what helps.
Dr. Lena Fischer ·
Science8 min read
Coastal Trapped Waves: The Weather That Travels Along Coastlines
Coastal trapped waves carry sea level, temperature and nutrient signals thousands of kilometres along coastlines — the ocean's long-distance phone line.
Dr. Lena Fischer ·
Science10 min read
The CTD Cast: How Oceanographers Read a Column of Water
A CTD cast reads temperature, salt and depth through the whole water column. Inside the instrument that gave oceanography its vertical vision.
Dr. Lena Fischer ·
Science9 min read
Diatom Blooms and Iron: The Spring Engine of Cold Seas
Every spring, cold seas ignite with diatom blooms — microscopic algae armoured in glass. The whole event often hinges on one scarce element: iron. Here's how.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Science9 min read
The Largest Commute on Earth: Diel Vertical Migration Below the Kelp
Every night, billions of animals rise hundreds of metres to feed, then sink before dawn. How the largest daily migration on Earth threads through kelp food webs.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Science8 min read
Drift Kelp and Wrack: The Forest's Gift to the Beach
Kelp forests export a share of everything they grow. Here's how drift kelp feeds open water, beach wrack feeds the shore, and why leaving wrack alone matters.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Science11 min read
Mapping Kelp Canopy with Drones: Photogrammetry Methods That Actually Work
How to plan, fly and process a drone survey over kelp canopy — tides, sun glint, polarisers, ground control — for maps you can compare year after year.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Science9 min read
Ecosystem Engineers: How Species Like Kelp Build Habitats
Ecosystem engineers are species that physically build or remodel habitats — kelp, corals, oysters, beavers. How the concept works and why it guides restoration.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Science9 min read
El Niño and La Niña Explained: The Pacific's Two Moods
How the ENSO cycle works — trade winds, thermocline tilt, warm pools and global teleconnections — and why the Pacific's mood swings reach every ocean.
Dr. Lena Fischer ·