A large-scale, long-term experiment on kelp forests off Southern California brings new insight to how the biodiversity of coastal ecosystems could be impacted over time as a changing climate potentially increases the frequency of ocean storms.

Researchers at the University of Virginia and the University of California, Santa Barbara experimentally mimicked the loss of undersea giant kelp forests at four locations off the coast of Santa Barbara and found that increasing storm frequency – as predicted by some climate change models – could dramatically alter the ratios and types of sea life that live along the California coastline.

“We found that the frequency of disturbance was the most important factor influencing kelp forest biodiversity, whereas the severity of disturbance in a given year played a minor role,” said lead researcher Max Castorani, a professor of environmental sciences at UVA.

Source: Study: Increasing frequency of ocean storms could alter kelp forest ecosystems