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Starfish on the beach in Wenningstedt: Winter storms are currently washing the animals out of the water on Sylt
Photo: Daniel Bockwoldt / dpa
It is an impressive and at the same time somewhat frightening sight that is currently surprising many a walker on the beaches of Sylt: Countless starfish lie dead on the sand.
The reason for this is the wintry weather.
In the cold months, one storm after the next often sweeps across the north.
The flat sea in front of the beaches gets a lot of movement.
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One of the starfish became a postcard motif
Photo: Daniel Bockwoldt / dpa
The starfish are careful not to get into the surf zone, as the biologist in the Multimar Wattforum National Park Center in Tönning, Claus von Hoerschelmann, explains.
However, during storms, currents and surf churn up areas further away from the beach.
In front of the islands and in the mudflats there are only a few stones or rocks that the starfish can cling to or crawl under.
"The animals that actually live safely here are now being washed away and will sooner or later end up on the beach."
Since starfish usually travel in very large groups, for example to attack mussel beds, many of them wash up together when the current is unfavorable.
Hearthedgehogs, tree tubeworms and razor clams are also uncovered by the deeper surf and washed up on the beach.
This means death for the affected animals.
However, the population of these animal species will not be reduced in the long term, says von Hoerschelmann.
»Other starfish and hedgehogs migrate back from the deeper zones, tree tubeworms and razor clams colonize these nutrient-rich areas again as larvae.« The not very nutritious starfish are hardly suitable as food for other animals.
"Even seagulls eat these only exceptionally."
The fact that starfish die in winter due to storms on German beaches happens again and again.
In 2021, thousands of dead animals lay on Timmendorfer Strand on the Baltic Sea, and in 2015 the starfish on the North Frisian beaches caused a stir.
However, the German phenomenon cannot be compared with the mass extinction of starfish on the North American Pacific coast.
A mysterious disease began to spread there about ten years ago, which drastically reduced the population of many species.
According to the US authorities, the wave of the disease has now flattened out, but the populations have not yet regenerated.
zob/dpa