Coastal Voices is a diverse group of Indigenous leaders, knowledge holders, scientists and artists from British Columbia and Alaska working together, discussing and planning for the profound changes triggered by the return of sea otters. Learn more about the Coastal Voices project here: coastalvoices.net
This is fascinating, and I love the way you present the big picture. The shot with a raft of otters really opened my eyes - the biomass it take must take to support that is enormous . My wife and I lead a beaver coexistence program in a Calgary urban park. We are seeing the same sort of keystone species impacts but on a much smaller scale.
Thanks for the feedback, really appreciate it! That sounds really interesting! I’m sure you have some really cool stories to tell about how that project has been progressing. Thanks for watching!
Hello David Bysouth. A somewhat distantly related story you could cover is the current government stance on the population control of coastal blacktail deer. There was the crazy expensive/cancelled sydney island cull. There are huge numbers now on Haida Gwaii as well.
You might want to look into the planned cull of wild horses on the eastern slopes of the Rockies. A group called HAWS (Help Alberta Wildies) has been tracking them annually by heilcopter and has hundreds of camera syations. The government's numbers mostly match theirs in a given year, but there are powerful lobbies s.as cattle producers trying to get rid of the horses. I suggest you look into this with some urgency, as the planned removal and darting of mares with anti-ovulation drugs is coming up soon.@@DavidBysouth
A complicated story. Thanks for this presentation. I remember in the early 70s carcasses of sea otters were sent to the zoology lab at U of A in Edmonton for necropsy.
Some these commenters must differentiate between sea otters and river otters. It is not uncommon, I often hear people referring to river otters as sea otters because only river otters populate some areas. River Otters and Sea Otters eating and habitat habits are distinctly different. River Otters eating mainly finfish species, climb on boats and mess docks and boats. In some vast areas, Sea otters have not yet recovered witnessed by the loss of kelp forest.
There’s a really big difference between commercial or grocery store food and traditional foods. Traditional foods or important nutritionally and culturally. The food that’s ‘available’ in a lot of cases does not replace this
It’s not that they rely on one thing, it’s that colonialism has led to the Canadian government never treating the indigenous peoples as human. Between residential schools and still active starvation programs it amazes me we can still hear their stories.
@@Dancinghats No residential school was built without a native tribe requesting (read demanding) it. The natives did not want to pay for the teachers and staff so this was contracted out to the lowest bidder. That caused the failure but no burials of any human remands have ever been found outside of Indian Graveyards. I live near three different "reserves" . There are a few normal weight people, NO underweight people but about 80% overweight people. Where, exactly, is this "Active starvation" program occurring?
This is great. I know there's tens of thousands in Alaska. They could spare some. We should get some of those giant grizzly bears from Kodiak Island. They are absolutely amazing bears
Simple win /win solution. In native communities areas a population cap on the otters' community. Once overreach has been achieved expand their range by population relocation. Move them to their historical areas first where they are missing. Share the shellfish resource of the sea. It a win/win for all concern.
If natives have the right to live there, the sea otters strongly belong to the British Columbia sea coast that was their home since the time before the natives were not there. ❤ lovely creature
So people view the otters were problematic, or competitors for seafood resources? How much sea urchin do YOU eat every week? lol. I never do. I thought that was like a fancy person food. "Uni" It’s delicious but.. That’s the preferred prey of the otters… meanwhile, I know said preferred prey are proliferating at staggering rates, destroying a lot of coastal kelp forests and contributing directly to coastal erosion, among other issues. Yet otters are viewed as a problem. 🤔 It’s very similar to wolves being extirpated and reintroduced, in Wyoming, or anywhere else. Without them keeping things in balance, by simply existing, certain prey animals become comfortable and border on nuisance. They reproduce and consume without restrictions. Hunters aren’t enough. Culling is ridiculous. Predators should be able to keep their natural roles! In this case, it’s sea urchins. Without the historical population of otters harvesting them, they now graze endlessly on the kelp beds up and down the American west coast. Just like elk and deer bred like rabbits without the wolves in Yellowstone, and of course each of those new babies has to eat! Once the grasses and pastures were plowed through, then its on to the browse, the riparian vegetation, the saplings, the small shoots of trees-none of which ever grew because they were all eaten. This loss of riverside and riparian foliage and root structure underground eventually caused rivers to widen and shorelines to erode. But as soon as wolves or otters make a comeback, they clearly start working in tandem with the other carnivores and animals, keeping the prey species in-check. In turns, this keeps the ecosystem stable, and we live in the ecosystem! Anyone who lives on the west coast of North America near the Pacific Ocean shares habitat with sea otters, thus depends on them in a sense. I think we underestimate the power smaller creatures have in our futures. If we lose all our kelp to the sea urchins, because the otters are so rare, nothing will be holding the coastline together. Of course, I know, it’s not all down to the kelp beds… but it’s like erosion on land, too… storm damage could increase in intensity, waves and tides might become dangerously bigger, even tsunamis could become a far greater risk. And yeah, I know a kelp forest cant possibly withstand a huge tsunami, lol. But for everyday tidal forces and trends, currents, etc., kelp forests are vital to the coastline.
Hmm, this is the first video I have ever seen where indigenous communities had an issue with a specific species of animals being reintroduced to their region. Taking a closer look at the map where their range has now reached, I’m guessing that sea otters weren’t in those areas before their downfall so I suppose there’s bound to be complications since I’ve seen this particular dilemma before. However, given the fact that the people truly understood the role that these animals play in their respective ecosystem, they’re willing to share their waters with them since like First Nations people of Canada, they too have the right to live in it. Native people and those who value and respect the natural world and all of its creatures are the ones who deserve to inherit the earth because the future belongs to those who preserve it, not destroy it. For what it’s worth, I consider myself very lucky to be one of them. The latter, mind you.
I will be honest. The "indigenous cultural traditions" of shellfish and urchins could not have been that widespread if one were to believe the numbers of sea otters now are so much lower than the the numbers were in the 18th century when the trade in their fur began, which in fact we know the numbers of sea otters are a fraction of what they were. I am all for cultural traditions if they do it in a traditional way. But if they start using innovations of Europeans, then it stops being anything more than using white guilt to utilize natural resources that frankly, would not be there due to money spent by tax payers. As soon as they are using motors on their boats, plastic, metal, monofilament or any other modern item, it ceases being cultural tradition, basically it would be like saying drinking rum is a cultural tradition. It was the largely the pursuit of rum by the natives that lead to the demise of the sea otter by natives in the first place.
I don’t understand why you completely avoided the reason for the relocation and time impetus. The biggest nuclear explosion ever done by the U.S. was to be done at Amchitka Island. They sent a biologist to Amchitka. He found one of the biggest populations of otters lived around the island. There was wide concern that the shock wave would kill most of the otters. So a bunch were captured prior to the explosion. They only had a couple short summer seasons to do so. Nothing was going to slow down the AEC’s explosion.These were scattered along the Oregon, Washington, and B.C. coasts. The Oregon populations fell to zero. The Washington introductions, fell, then limped along before slowly rising off the northern, rocky coasts. Eventually they managed to eat enough urchins that kelp returned, providing the environment they need to thrive in open coast. And the over exploitation of the sea otters started well before James Cook ever came to the northeast Pacific. See Behring, and the repeated seasonal enslavements of the Aleuts. The Russians forced otter and seal hunts as far south as California. Dyson in Baidarka discusses this if you want to access this information in an easy reading format. The English were late comers. The commercial harvest of sea urchins is not based on traditional usage. It’s based on an excessive population associated with the regional extinction of sea otters and the industrial technical development of SCUBA. Add in the high tech wet suit provided by an advanced petrochemical industry. Local indigenous peoples are not immune to shifting baseline viewpoint. There were lots of urchins when they were young, so that’s what’s normal, your interviewees feel. It’s like seeing a dry land wheat field for seventy years and thinking it’s always been like that, instead of having the ability to conceive that not that long ago it was sage brush steppe. So maybe it is time to harvest a few sea otters. In Canada the pelts would sell for quite a bit.
No, you _cannot_ allow commerce in any part of an endangered species - as seen with elephant ivory any legalised market inevitably opens a flood of poaching with the poached products easily and untraceably mixed into the legal trade.
Got two words for the opponents - FU! Ancient ways were fine for ancient times. In case no one noticed, civilization has progressed a bit since 10,000 BC. Not saying there is no value in learning and protecting the MEMORY of old ways, but to just STOP evolving our society and stay rooted to ANY era is a recipe for stagnation - which for humans would be disastrous.
What an absolutely stupid title when you ask (is it a good thing to bring back sea otters? ) bringing back any animal that has been devastated by humanity is a good thing. Before Europeans came to North America there was no problem with sea otters because they were part of the ecosystem as all other animals are. Human beings are the problem.
The title is meant to convey that conservation work isn’t black and white. Even if the underlying premise of the project is a net positive, there are inherently challenges that can arise as well. In this case, while many view the otter reintroduction as a good thing, there are big challenges associated with food security. The video does highlight many of the benefits of otter reintroduction, but also the challenges coastal communities and fisheries have been experiencing. Sorry if you didn’t get what you wanted out of the video
Coastal Voices is a diverse group of Indigenous leaders, knowledge holders, scientists and artists from British Columbia and Alaska working together, discussing and planning for the profound changes triggered by the return of sea otters. Learn more about the Coastal Voices project here: coastalvoices.net
This is fascinating, and I love the way you present the big picture. The shot with a raft of otters really opened my eyes - the biomass it take must take to support that is enormous . My wife and I lead a beaver coexistence program in a Calgary urban park. We are seeing the same sort of keystone species impacts but on a much smaller scale.
Thanks for the feedback, really appreciate it! That sounds really interesting! I’m sure you have some really cool stories to tell about how that project has been progressing. Thanks for watching!
Bring back the beaver, they know what to do. Just let them do it. Please
Great vid!
Thanks so much!
love this
Thanks for watching!
Hello David Bysouth. A somewhat distantly related story you could cover is the current government stance on the population control of coastal blacktail deer. There was the crazy expensive/cancelled sydney island cull. There are huge numbers now on Haida Gwaii as well.
Thanks for the suggestion, I can look into this!
You might want to look into the planned cull of wild horses on the eastern slopes of the Rockies. A group called HAWS (Help Alberta Wildies) has been tracking them annually by heilcopter and has hundreds of camera syations. The government's numbers mostly match theirs in a given year, but there are powerful lobbies s.as cattle producers trying to get rid of the horses. I suggest you look into this with some urgency, as the planned removal and darting of mares with anti-ovulation drugs is coming up soon.@@DavidBysouth
A complicated story. Thanks for this presentation. I remember in the early 70s carcasses of sea otters were sent to the zoology lab at U of A in Edmonton for necropsy.
Human drove them to extinction, of course it is our duty to bring them back.
Great point, thanks for watching!
Some these commenters must differentiate between sea otters and river otters. It is not uncommon, I often hear people referring to river otters as sea otters because only river otters populate some areas. River Otters and Sea Otters eating and habitat habits are distinctly different. River Otters eating mainly finfish species, climb on boats and mess docks and boats. In some vast areas, Sea otters have not yet recovered witnessed by the loss of kelp forest.
With all the available food in Canada and the US that is not seafood, it amazes me that they still depend on one thing only.
There’s a really big difference between commercial or grocery store food and traditional foods. Traditional foods or important nutritionally and culturally. The food that’s ‘available’ in a lot of cases does not replace this
It’s not that they rely on one thing, it’s that colonialism has led to the Canadian government never treating the indigenous peoples as human. Between residential schools and still active starvation programs it amazes me we can still hear their stories.
@Dancinghats I agree
@@Dancinghats No residential school was built without a native tribe requesting (read demanding) it. The natives did not want to pay for the teachers and staff so this was contracted out to the lowest bidder. That caused the failure but no burials of any human remands have ever been found outside of Indian Graveyards. I live near three different "reserves" . There are a few normal weight people, NO underweight people but about 80% overweight people. Where, exactly, is this "Active starvation" program occurring?
@@qualicumwilson5168 New York Times article "How Thousands of Indigenous Children Vanished in Canada", Ian Austin, June 7, 2021
This is great. I know there's tens of thousands in Alaska. They could spare some. We should get some of those giant grizzly bears from Kodiak Island. They are absolutely amazing bears
Simple win /win solution. In native communities areas a population cap on the otters' community. Once overreach has been achieved expand their range by population relocation. Move them to their historical areas first where they are missing. Share the shellfish resource of the sea. It a win/win for all concern.
If natives have the right to live there, the sea otters strongly belong to the British Columbia sea coast that was their home since the time before the natives were not there.
❤ lovely creature
So people view the otters were problematic, or competitors for seafood resources? How much sea urchin do YOU eat every week? lol. I never do. I thought that was like a fancy person food. "Uni" It’s delicious but.. That’s the preferred prey of the otters… meanwhile, I know said preferred prey are proliferating at staggering rates, destroying a lot of coastal kelp forests and contributing directly to coastal erosion, among other issues. Yet otters are viewed as a problem. 🤔
It’s very similar to wolves being extirpated and reintroduced, in Wyoming, or anywhere else. Without them keeping things in balance, by simply existing, certain prey animals become comfortable and border on nuisance. They reproduce and consume without restrictions. Hunters aren’t enough. Culling is ridiculous. Predators should be able to keep their natural roles! In this case, it’s sea urchins. Without the historical population of otters harvesting them, they now graze endlessly on the kelp beds up and down the American west coast. Just like elk and deer bred like rabbits without the wolves in Yellowstone, and of course each of those new babies has to eat! Once the grasses and pastures were plowed through, then its on to the browse, the riparian vegetation, the saplings, the small shoots of trees-none of which ever grew because they were all eaten. This loss of riverside and riparian foliage and root structure underground eventually caused rivers to widen and shorelines to erode. But as soon as wolves or otters make a comeback, they clearly start working in tandem with the other carnivores and animals, keeping the prey species in-check. In turns, this keeps the ecosystem stable, and we live in the ecosystem! Anyone who lives on the west coast of North America near the Pacific Ocean shares habitat with sea otters, thus depends on them in a sense. I think we underestimate the power smaller creatures have in our futures. If we lose all our kelp to the sea urchins, because the otters are so rare, nothing will be holding the coastline together. Of course, I know, it’s not all down to the kelp beds… but it’s like erosion on land, too… storm damage could increase in intensity, waves and tides might become dangerously bigger, even tsunamis could become a far greater risk. And yeah, I know a kelp forest cant possibly withstand a huge tsunami, lol. But for everyday tidal forces and trends, currents, etc., kelp forests are vital to the coastline.
Thank God and I'm against all fishermen who would oppose them or even try to kill them! StocktonRob
Great video! Maybe skip the background music when people are talking though, it’s especially hard to hear the individuals who speak softer! 😘
Why is that a question
Hmm, this is the first video I have ever seen where indigenous communities had an issue with a specific species of animals being reintroduced to their region. Taking a closer look at the map where their range has now reached, I’m guessing that sea otters weren’t in those areas before their downfall so I suppose there’s bound to be complications since I’ve seen this particular dilemma before. However, given the fact that the people truly understood the role that these animals play in their respective ecosystem, they’re willing to share their waters with them since like First Nations people of Canada, they too have the right to live in it. Native people and those who value and respect the natural world and all of its creatures are the ones who deserve to inherit the earth because the future belongs to those who preserve it, not destroy it. For what it’s worth, I consider myself very lucky to be one of them. The latter, mind you.
I will be honest. The "indigenous cultural traditions" of shellfish and urchins could not have been that widespread if one were to believe the numbers of sea otters now are so much lower than the the numbers were in the 18th century when the trade in their fur began, which in fact we know the numbers of sea otters are a fraction of what they were. I am all for cultural traditions if they do it in a traditional way. But if they start using innovations of Europeans, then it stops being anything more than using white guilt to utilize natural resources that frankly, would not be there due to money spent by tax payers. As soon as they are using motors on their boats, plastic, metal, monofilament or any other modern item, it ceases being cultural tradition, basically it would be like saying drinking rum is a cultural tradition. It was the largely the pursuit of rum by the natives that lead to the demise of the sea otter by natives in the first place.
I don’t understand why you completely avoided the reason for the relocation and time impetus. The biggest nuclear explosion ever done by the U.S. was to be done at Amchitka Island. They sent a biologist to Amchitka. He found one of the biggest populations of otters lived around the island. There was wide concern that the shock wave would kill most of the otters. So a bunch were captured prior to the explosion. They only had a couple short summer seasons to do so. Nothing was going to slow down the AEC’s explosion.These were scattered along the Oregon, Washington, and B.C. coasts. The Oregon populations fell to zero. The Washington introductions, fell, then limped along before slowly rising off the northern, rocky coasts. Eventually they managed to eat enough urchins that kelp returned, providing the environment they need to thrive in open coast.
And the over exploitation of the sea otters started well before James Cook ever came to the northeast Pacific. See Behring, and the repeated seasonal enslavements of the Aleuts. The Russians forced otter and seal hunts as far south as California. Dyson in Baidarka discusses this if you want to access this information in an easy reading format. The English were late comers.
The commercial harvest of sea urchins is not based on traditional usage. It’s based on an excessive population associated with the regional extinction of sea otters and the industrial technical development of SCUBA. Add in the high tech wet suit provided by an advanced petrochemical industry. Local indigenous peoples are not immune to shifting baseline viewpoint. There were lots of urchins when they were young, so that’s what’s normal, your interviewees feel. It’s like seeing a dry land wheat field for seventy years and thinking it’s always been like that, instead of having the ability to conceive that not that long ago it was sage brush steppe.
So maybe it is time to harvest a few sea otters. In Canada the pelts would sell for quite a bit.
No, you _cannot_ allow commerce in any part of an endangered species - as seen with elephant ivory any legalised market inevitably opens a flood of poaching with the poached products easily and untraceably mixed into the legal trade.
Got two words for the opponents - FU! Ancient ways were fine for ancient times. In case no one noticed, civilization has progressed a bit since 10,000 BC. Not saying there is no value in learning and protecting the MEMORY of old ways, but to just STOP evolving our society and stay rooted to ANY era is a recipe for stagnation - which for humans would be disastrous.
What an absolutely stupid title when you ask (is it a good thing to bring back sea otters? ) bringing back any animal that has been devastated by humanity is a good thing. Before Europeans came to North America there was no problem with sea otters because they were part of the ecosystem as all other animals are. Human beings are the problem.
The title is meant to convey that conservation work isn’t black and white. Even if the underlying premise of the project is a net positive, there are inherently challenges that can arise as well. In this case, while many view the otter reintroduction as a good thing, there are big challenges associated with food security. The video does highlight many of the benefits of otter reintroduction, but also the challenges coastal communities and fisheries have been experiencing. Sorry if you didn’t get what you wanted out of the video