Credit: David Kimbro
Experiment in the intertidal of California's Tomales Bay in which cages were used to either include or exclude invasive predators from oysters. Big shades (black-top cages) were also created to see if oyster mortality was indeed caused by invasive whelks or by warmer temperatures. Incoming tide as concealed oysters within the cages. The experiment was conducted simulataneously at an invaded beach and an un-invaded beach. At the invaded beach, invasive whelks caused the high oyster mortality. At the un-invaded beach, only the inclusion of invasive snails lead to higher oyster mortality. So, the invasive snail would wipe-out the remaining oyster reefs in the middle bay if it were to expand into that region....good thing there are native crabs there to prevent this.