RESEARCH ARTICLE Kelp forests at the end of the earth: 45 years later 1,2 3 4 5 Alan M. FriedlanderID *, Enric Ballesteros , Tom W. Bell , Jennifer E. Caselle , Claudio Campagna6, Whitney Goodell1,2, Mathias HuÈ ne7, Alex Muñoz1, Pelayo Salinas-de- 1,8 1 9 Leo nID , Enric Sala , Paul K. Dayton 1 Pristine Seas, National Geographic Society, Washington, DC, United States of America, 2 Hawai`i Institute of Marine Biology, Kāne`ohe, Hawai`i, United States of America, 3 Centre d'Estudis AvancËats (CEAB-CSIC), Blanes, Spain, 4 Earth Research Institute, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, California, United States of America, 5 Marine Science Institute, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, a1111111111 California, United States of America, 6 Wildlife Conservation Society, Buenos Aires, Argentina, 7 FundacioÂn a1111111111 IctioloÂgica, Santiago, Chile, 8 Charles Darwin Research Station, Puerto Ayora, GalaÂpagos Islands, Ecuador, a1111111111 9 Scripps Institute of Oceanography, University of California San Diego, San Diego, California, United States a1111111111 of America a1111111111 *
[email protected] Abstract OPEN ACCESS The kelp forests of southern South America are some of the least disturbed on the planet. Citation: Friedlander AM, Ballesteros E, Bell TW, Caselle JE, Campagna C, Goodell W, et al. (2020) The remoteness of this region has, until recently, spared it from many of the direct anthropo- Kelp forests at the end of the earth: 45 years later. genic stressors that have negatively affected these ecosystems elsewhere. Re-surveys of PLoS ONE 15(3): e0229259. https://doi.org/ 11 locations at the easternmost extent of Tierra del Fuego originally conducted in 1973 10.1371/journal.pone.0229259 showed no significant differences in the densities of adult and juvenile Macrocystis pyrifera Editor: Maura (Gee) Geraldine Chapman, University kelp or kelp holdfast diameter between the two survey periods.