7 articles
Keystone species hold ecosystems together despite small numbers. How Robert Paine's starfish experiment defined the idea — and what it means for kelp forests.
Dr. Theo Nakamura ·
A field guide to finding the ochre sea star, reading the mussel line it maintains, and understanding what its recovery after wasting disease tells us.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
The sunflower sea star was the kelp forest's great urchin hunter. Wasting disease erased billions of them — and the consequences reshaped coastlines.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
A trophic cascade happens when a predator's removal rewrites an entire ecosystem. The sea otter–urchin–kelp story is ecology's classic case — here's how it works.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Sea otters eat a quarter of their body weight a day — much of it sea urchins. How this small predator became the kelp forest's most famous keystone species.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Meet the ochre sea star, the purple tidepool predator whose removal in a famous 1960s experiment coined the keystone species concept.
Dr. Theo Nakamura ·
How a handful of scientists — from Paine's starfish to Estes's sea otters — discovered that predators architect entire ecosystems from the top down.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·