Kelp Forest and Sandy Beach Connectivity
Fuels the Coastal Food Web

Guest Presenter: Kyle A. Emery, PhD
Assistant Researcher
Marine Science Institute
University of California, Santa Barbara

Thursday, August 28, 2025
Noyo Center Marine Field Station
32430 N. Harbor Dr., Fort Bragg
5:00 Happy Hour
6:00 Presentation Begins

Maintaining ecosystem connectivity is a key for the resilience of ecosystems to climate change. The largest observed cross-ecosystem fluxes are from marine to terrestrial systems, consist of exported primary production, and are driven by currents and tides. An exceptional example is the subsidy of organic matter exported by highly productive nearshore kelp forests to sandy beaches. Kelp exports from nearshore kelp forests to beaches support the biodiversity and ecosystem functioning of sandy beaches, as well as fuel highly productive beach food webs. Kelp wrack inputs to beaches are highly dynamic. Here, we utilized a kelp tagging experiment, local (100 m) to regional (100 km) scale measurements of kelp inputs, and nearshore kelp supply to determine the spatial relationship between beaches and kelp forests and the impacts on the animals which utilize these kelp inputs.

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Kyle Emery, PhD, is Research Faculty at the University of California, Santa Barbara. His research program is focused on quantifying and understanding the ecological implications of coastal ecosystem connectivity, particularly between kelp forests and sandy beaches, and how the impacts of climate change can alter these dynamics via changes to food webs and community composition. His research is also focused on measuring the attributes of and changes in coastal habitats including kelp forests, rocky intertidal, sandy beaches, and dunes using remote sensing (drones, satellite imagery) approaches.