11 articles
The bat star (Patiria miniata) is the kelp forest's web-fingered clean-up crew — a slow omnivore that turns detritus into reef fertility. Facts, ecology, where to see one.
Dr. Theo Nakamura ·
Meet the giant spined sea star, Pisaster giganteus — a blue-gray, knobby-armed giant of kelp-edge sand flats that hunts sand dollars and can span half a metre.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
The leather star (Dermasterias imbricata) is a smooth, slippery, garlic-scented sea star that hunts anemones and sea cucumbers — biology, range and how to find it.
Dr. Theo Nakamura ·
With up to sixteen arms and a taste for other sea stars, the morning sun star is the kelp forest's fastest hunter — and a weathervane of sea star wasting.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
Meet the giant pink sea star — a two-foot, sand-plowing predator of clams and sand dollars that patrols the soft floors between Pacific kelp forests.
Dr. Theo Nakamura ·
Rainbow star (Orthasterias koehleri): a red-and-orange sea star of Pacific kelp reefs that eats snails, clams and even small sea urchins.
Dr. Mara Ellison ·
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 ·
Evasterias troschelii, the mottled or false ochre star — the soft-bodied, deep-dwelling predator that picks off limpets, whelks and baby sea stars.
Dr. Theo Nakamura ·
The spiny sun star is a many-armed predator of cold reefs in both northern oceans. How to identify Crossaster papposus, what it eats, and why it matters.
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 ·