The Man Whose Dynasty Changed Ecology
Wednesday, January 16, 2013 - 13:30
in Paleontology & Archaeology
Bob Paine is nearly 2 meters tall and has a powerful grip. The ochre sea star, however, has five sucker-lined arms and can span half a meter. So when Paine tried to prise the creatures off the rocks along the Pacific coast, he found that his brute strength simply wasn't enough. In the end, he resorted to a crowbar. Then, once he had levered the animals up, he hurled them out to sea as hard as he could. “You get pretty good at throwing starfish into deeper water,” he says. [More]