For years, Macklyn Cove was a land of the living dead.

Located near Brookings along Oregon's south coast, the cove was once home to vast underwater kelp forests that supported species as small as shrimp to as massive as gray whales while sequestering carbon.

Then the urchins took over.

After their major predator was nearly wiped out by disease, millions of purple sea urchins enveloped the Oregon Coast, grazing on the stems of bull kelp. Between 2010 and 2024, two-thirds of Oregon's kelp forests disappeared.

Urchins can live in a zombie-like state even after food runs out, reawakening if kelp tries to regrow. That creates vast urchin barrens where diverse ecosystems once stood.

"It's like if you have an acre of pasture and one goat on that pasture, then you increase that to 1,000 goats

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