THE ENVIRONMENT

Cod, Eels, and the Quiet Power Beneath Our Feet

New research shows the fish we love to eat are also busy engineers of the seafloor, shaping ecosystems and carbon storage in ways we’ve long ignored.

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I remember the first time I saw a little fish sweeping the seafloor while snorkeling in the coast where I grew up. It wasn’t fast or flashy. Just this gentle, gliding creature stirring up sand as it passed.

I watched it long enough to realize something odd: everywhere it moved, it reshaped the seafloor ever so slightly. At the time, I was focused on macrofauna distributions and food webs. But I logged that moment in my mind. Years later, while teaching an ecology course, I pulled it out again when we reached sediment processes. I told my students, “You think fish just swim around, but many of them are also moving the ocean floor under our noses.”

Now that explains how, beyond fun-to-watch behaviors, this is also how fish reshape their landscapes, turning them into ecosystem engineers.