These otters eat a variety of fish, invertebrates and small mammals including the occasional rabbit. The researchers say the effect on sea otters is devastating: one killer whale can eat nearly 2,000 of them in a year. Also the enemy is a man. What is kelp and why is it important? Also the enemy is a man. Sea Otters typically eat amphibians, smaller fish, mollusks, mussels, snails, and smaller underwater creatures. The sea otter is the heaviest of the otter species with large males weighing as much as 100 pounds. However, it is true that the cost to clean and rehabilitate oiled sea otters was about $80,000 per animal. Moose can dive up to 20 feet and they do this to eat aquatic plants from the bottom of the water. It prefers to eat invertebrates like crabs, snails, urchins, clams, abalone and mussels — for breakfast, lunch, dinner and between-meal snacks! Do Orcas Eat Other Deer Species. Otters eat urchin, urchins eat kelp. The existing Open Comments threads will continue to exist for those who do not subscribe to Independent Premium. If orcas start to eat more sea otters than normal, the sea otter population would decrease, giving the sea urchins a better chance of surviving. Threat to ecosystem. They are sometimes called the wolves of the sea, because they hunt in groups like wolf packs. That said, the size of the kelp forest depends on the animals who live there. Researchers theorize that the divergent, specialized feeding habits of resident and transient killer whales help prevent these two groups of whales from competing with each other for food. Jim Estes, a biologist at the US Geological Survey and the University of California, Santa Cruz, describes in the journal Science how hungry whales have slaughtered the region's population of sea otters, which have declined by about 25 per cent a year since 1990. Sea otters eat 25 to 30 percent of their body weight each day in seafood, including sea urchins, fish, clams, snails, worms, sea stars, crabs, squid, octopus, and abalone. When orcas started eating sea otters in the kelp forest ecosystem described in the video, the sea otter population _____, the urchin population _____, and the kelp population _____. They usually prey on squids, octopus, seals, sea lions, sea otters, rays, dolphins, sharks, baleen whales and of course, bony fishes. Other reported predators that feed on sea otters include stellar sea lions, coyotes, bears and eagles. Besides, they also prefer to eat crabs, large barnacles, mussels, snails, tubeworms, clams, squid, octopuses, chitons, scallops, sea cucumbers, sea stars and abalone. Since they inhabit a diverse ecosystem, their eating habits vary depending on the geographical area. You can find our Community Guidelines in full here. - Definition & Examples, Appositives & Appositive Phrases: Definition & Examples. Kelp forests are found on coastlines and grow in colder waters. The usual diet of killer whales is stellar sea lions and harbour seals, both of whose populations have seriously declined in the North Pacific. Glacier Wind Charters: Humpbacks, orcas, sea otters - oh my! Researchers from NOAA working on the critically-endangered killer whales and an OSU team looking at otters rely on poop samples to study their subjects. What do sea otters eat? First, Williams determines that the average orca needs to eat the equivalent of five to seven sea otters a day just to get by. Because of this, answer choices A, C, and D are incorrect and would not make any sense in the scenario. What caused the loss of sea otters along the coasts of Washington State and Oregon? Sea otters eat sea urchins in abundance where they both occur but also prey on crabs and other crustaceans and mollusks. These marine mammals thrive in cold coastal waters and kelp forests from Russia’s Pacific Coast to Alaska and down to California. Why have sea otters been compared to teddy bears? For an orca, a sea otter is a very small, very hairy hors d’oeuvre. (The sea otter is an endangered species). Sea otters usually have a single pup, born in the water. a) The population of sea urchins, the main food of sea otters, has increased since the sea otter population declined b) Seals do not eat sea otters, nor do they compete with sea otters for food. Common predators of sea otters include various predatory marine mammals such as orcas and sea lions. 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