Help with kelp to continue thanks to partnership

Efforts to restore kelp along the Orange County coast can continue for at least three more years thanks to a new partnership between kelp boosters and the Aquarium of the Pacific.

Marine biologist Nancy Caruso has worked on kelp reforestation for several years, first with water-quality watchdog Orange County Coastkeeper and since 2005 through the California Coastkeeper Alliance. The program has included education and involving students in growing kelp, which biologists then plant in the ocean off Little Corona, Crystal Cove and elsewhere.

Kelp forests are home to fish and other ocean life, but they’ve disappeared in recent years, possibly due to storms, sea urchins and pollution. But Caruso will continue replanting kelp by working with the Aquarium of the Pacific, she wrote in a recent e-mail to people interested in the project. She will try to raise $300,000 over three years to cover kelp planting, monitoring and education. It comes just in time, as a 2005 grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration was set to run out in August.

— Alicia Robinson