welcome to mutual of Omaha's Wild
Kingdom
for decades researchers have braved to
Pacific's icy waters to study the
wonders of the kelp forests and Wild
Kingdom has been there too exploring and
documenting this fascinating world join
us as we take a look back at previous
adventures because it's here that cold
ocean currents and warm currents
converge this means that you can find a
great variety of marine animals in one
comparatively small area here on the
channel islands off the coast of
Southern California off the coast of
California in the vicinity of Catalina
Island we're entering an underwater
forests of kelp when Wild Kingdom
explored the kelp forests in 1973 Marlin
and the team were among the first to
document the cause of the disappearing
kelp beds any large scale pet like this
began to disappear in recent years and
scientists finally discovered one of the
reason these dark little pin cushions on
this rock these are sea urchin these
spiny little animals eat through the
base of the kelp and set it adrift and
they can literally mow down acres with
with giant plants the spines are sharp
and huddle fish seem attractants into
sea urchin but this is not their usual
food the spines are too effective a
defense
the main problem now is that the sea
urchins have increased tremendously in
lumber quickly because their natural
enemy the sea otter has been hunted
almost to extinction the other life here
like these face can't handle that spiny
shell
and so the sea urchin population is
unchecked by any predator we may want to
return here for a closer look at the
kelp damage the urchins are causing
in 2017 Wild Kingdom returned to do just
that we teamed up with dr. Jen Cassell
of the Marine Science Institute at the
University of California Santa Barbara
they discovered protections implemented
in 2003 have had a positive impact on
the abundance of giant kelp and the
biodiversity in the protected areas
while urgent's are still a problem
climate change is now a much greater
threat that impacts all oceans warming
water temperatures rising sea levels and
ocean acidification just to name a few
so while the conditions that threatened
kelp may have changed over the past 45
years the path forward remains the same
perhaps the time has come when man too
must finally learn to adapt to his world
to live in true balance and harmony with
the other living things that share this
planet to preserve the many wonders of
the Wild Kingdom with every passing
decade these words have more relevance
and even more urgency in fact most
conservationists and scientists believe
that animals fit into the web of all
nature and that the status of our
wildlife is a vital indicator of the
status of our own environment if we're
to survive so must our wildlife survive
because it's not just the oceans that
are at risk our very lives yours mine
all of mankind's may be at stake because
we ourselves may become extinct if we
destroy our priceless heritage the Wild
Kingdom
you