Research

Research

The Coastal Connections Research Group at UC Santa Cruz, led by Frankie Gerraty, investigates connections between land and sea, people and place, and social and ecological systems. We aspire to practice rigorous, critical, and solutions-driven scholarship that contributes towards positive change.

Coastal Ecology

We study how organisms shape the ecosystems they inhabit through their roles as predators, ecosystem engineers, and vectors of nutrient redistribution. In tandem, we investigate how environmental variation influences wildlife assemblages, species interactions, and ecosystem processes.

One major focus of our research is land-sea connections. Marine and terrestrial ecosystems are linked by the movement of organisms, nutrients, energy, contaminants, and pathogens across ecological boundaries. We investigate these connections to better understand coastal ecosystem function, identify human impacts on ecological connectivity, and develop holistic conservation approaches.

Most of our research focuses on coastal ecosystems—especially rocky shores, sandy beaches, kelp forests, seagrass beds, and nearshore terrestrial ecosystems. However, despite our strong affinity for the coast, we are interested in human-environment interactions across diverse land- and seascapes.

Coastal coyote and elephant seal in Point Reyes. Photo: Anela Kopshever

Global Change

Coastal ecosystems are increasingly exposed to multiple, interacting forms of environmental change. We investigate how global change stressors (e.g., climate change, landscape transformation, defaunation) drive ecological shifts, with particular interest in their consequences for ecological connectivity, ecosystem structure, and conservation priorities.

Long-term ecological observations and historical ecology approaches provide a critical foundation for this work. By examining ecological systems across space and through time, we seek to understand how environmental changes in the past shape contemporary ecosystems—and how these ecosystems will respond to future change.

Figure 2 from Gerraty et al. (2026)

Social-Ecological Systems

Human societies shape the more-than-human world, while ecological dynamics in turn shape human societies. The ways that humans interact with wildlife and landscapes are strongly influenced by culture, values, institutions, economies, and histories, meaning that human impacts on ecosystems are often highly variable and context-dependent.

We study how historical and contemporary social systems influence ecological dynamics across scales, from animal behavior and health to ecosystem structure and function. We are also interested in social-ecological drivers of human-wildlife conflict and coexistence.

In particular, we interrogate the social-ecological legacies of colonialism—settler and otherwise—and its role in shaping interconnected social and ecological change.

Planetary Health

Infectious diseases are a growing threat for both humans and wildlife, and wildlife disease outbreaks can produce dramatic shifts in ecosystem structure and function. We investigate the community ecology of emerging wildlife diseases, with close attention to the direct and indirect pathways through which human actions and infrastructures influence disease dynamics.

Rooted in an understanding that human health is contingent upon the health of multi-species life support systems composed of animals, plants, soils, microbes, waterways, and other diverse life forms, a fundamental goal of our research is to contribute towards a healthy future for humans and our multi-species kin.

Projects

Several of our active research projects include:

Assessing the roles of marine megafauna as connectors of land and sea
Cascading effects of marine mammal carrion subsidies to coyotes
Human impacts to shoreline scavenging dynamics
Ecosystem consequences of sea star wasting
Causes and consequences of sarcoptic mange infection in coastal coyotes
The role of scavenging in avian influenza transmission dynamics at the land-sea interface
Long-term ecological monitoring with the Multi-Agency Rocky Intertidal Network (MARINe) and Gulf Watch Alaska

Check out publications for more!

Who We Are

Frankie Gerraty and team. Current: Gabriel Gott, Daniel Hohl, Selah Hyson, Megan Ireland, AK Manivannan, Remie Nguyen, Skylar Sidensol-Denero
Past: Theresa Burgos, Valeria Cuevas, Ashley Rogers, Hannah Cassidy, Karla Vaca, Mia Laskan, Isabella Turner, Ann Gobei-Bacaylan, Kaia Diel, Skyler Williams, Zoe Reiss

In The Media