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Sea otter eating a marsh crab in Elkhorn Slough
A sea otter eats a marsh crab in Elkhorn Slough, an estuary on Monterey Bay in California. A study suggests the recolonization of otters has significantly slowed erosion of creekbanks and marsh edges by controlling the population of crabs, which eat roots and dig into soil.
[Research supported by U.S. National Science Foundation grant CBET 1652628.]
Learn more in the Duke University news story As sea otters recolonize a California estuary, they restore its degraded geology. (Date of image: 2019; date originally posted to NSF Multimedia Gallery: Feb. 23, 2024)
Credit: Killiii Yuyan
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