page_title: Urchin barren
hierarchical_section_title: Urchin barren
caption_attribution_description: Photograph of a sea urchin
context_page_description: Urchin barrens are places in the ocean where sea urchins have eaten and killed so many kelp plants that they turned a kelp forest into something like a desert. This happens when there are too many sea urchins. The fish, krill and other animals that live in the kelp either die or leave. Urchin barrens occur in coastal areas of the Pacific Ocean.
  Urchin barrens had been forming for a long time, but in the second half of the 2010s, there were suddenly many more.
context_section_description: Urchin barrens are places in the ocean where sea urchins have eaten and killed so many kelp plants that they turned a kelp forest into something like a desert. This happens when there are too many sea urchins. The fish, krill and other animals that live in the kelp either die or leave. Urchin barrens occur in coastal areas of the Pacific Ocean.
  Urchin barrens had been forming for a long time, but in the second half of the 2010s, there were suddenly many more.
caption: Sea urchins can eat large amounts of kelp.
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