90.7 WMFE: Sea Urchins to the Rescue: Florida Researchers Launch Breeding Program
Florida has an underappreciated secret weapon to help heal its ailing reefs: prickly sea urchins.
This week, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration unveiled a $97 million rescue effort expected to take five to seven years. Part of the plan will include an unprecedented lab-breeding program to help revive long-spined sea urchins, a shimmering black-spined urchin, and one of the largest on the planet.
The move was made possible after University of Florida researchers at The Florida Aquarium succeeded in producing lab-bred urchins for the first time in large numbers this summer.
“There’s been a lot of work probably over the past 15 years where people have tried to get these to grow,” said Aaron Pilnick, a researcher and PhD student at UF’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences. “It has to be perfect, from A to Z.”