The truth is quite different than the rosy pic ture Shimek paints. His keystone species argument holds little water either. Dr. Foster concluded that the Califor nia near shore marine environment is much more complex than that of Alaska where sea otters are consid ered keystone. Clearly, there are differing camps. For those like myself, I can live with the sea otter in its range between Santa Cruz to Santa Maria, but this notion that we must give up our shellfish fisheries in California to satisfy the caloric needs of sea otters is foolish ness.
Sea otters eat quite a lot.
As few as 100 sea otters can consume a half-million to a million pounds of abalone, sea urchin, crab and lob ster per year. The way I read the da ta, there are more than 2,000 sea ot ters in California or 10 to 20 million pounds per year. While this may ap pear to rival the annual human har vest, unlike humans, sea otters have no size limit, no season, and no limited entry. Humans know enough to leave behind slightly sub-legal size individuals for next season. What they leave behind is inches smaller than those we chose to harvest.