(gentle music)
- [Chris] The Salish Sea, this world famous waterway,
a system of interconnected marine ecosystems
and its web of upstream links to
rivers, forest, mountains, and glaciers
sustains a huge abundance of life.
Not only the creatures of the sea, air, and land,
but us too, the people who live here.
My name is Chris Morgan.
As a wildlife ecologist, filmmaker,
and host of the podcast "The Wild"
I'm endlessly curious about life in our region
and the mysteries of how it all fits together.
(upbeat music)
(gentle music)
Kelp forests,
just like the forests on land,
these giant ribbons of majestic underwater greenery
are teeming with life,
providing food and shelter to thousands of species,
from zooplankton to salmon,
from the mighty and iconic orcas
to a little known superstar called the pinto abalone.
Not only that, these kelp forests connect to each other
from Asia to the Americas,
to create massive interconnected ecosystems
called kelp highways.
Yes, kelp highways have played a critical role
in the history of human migration.
In a lot of ways,
kelp is the bedrock that has allowed the Pacific Northwest
to thrive.
The Coast Salish people know this,
they've lived alongside these kelp forests
for tens of thousands of years.
So I'm headed out to meet Casey Finkbonner
a Coast Salish fishermen from the Lummi Nation
to find out more about how this blade of seaweed
could create all this life.
(upbeat acoustic playing)
- [Casey] My oldest son, he's 15, his name's Phoenyx.
My younger son is 12, his name's King.
- Are they following in your footsteps
with the fishing then?
- They definitely following in my footsteps.
Even if I tried to not let them,
they still gonna follow in my footsteps, so.
(laughing)
But no, that's.. their eyes light up every time we go home
and that's all they want to do.
Can we go fishing?
They fish without me now, so.
It all starts with the kelp.
I feel everything starts with the kelp,
even when we're diving
for cucumbers, sea urchins, everything
we're targeting kelp, we're looking for kelp,
but even with the salmon,
the salmon travel through the kelp
and you'll see the killer whales rushing up
in through the kelp,
trying to scare the salmon out so they could feed.
When you're out of here in the San Juan islands
and you see all that kelp, you just know as a diver,
what that's gonna entail when you dive down underneath,
cause you see all the different species,
you see the urchins, you see the cucumbers,
you see the fish hiding out in the kelp.
You see the richness of the kelp.
The kelp has to survive
for everything else in the ecosystem to survive.
- [Chris] Casey's passion for the kelp
and the systems of life it supports moves me deeply.
I want to learn more.
So I'm headed to Seattle Aquarium to meet Ryan Crim,
a native tribal member
and Puget Sound Restoration Fund biologist
to talk about a tiny creature with one big foot
and mother of pearl shell
that he and other partners are working to restore.
Why?
Because the pinto abalone are a key species
in protecting kelp.
- Abalone are really cool creatures.
They are super charismatic
and they are native to the Northeast Pacific coastline
from Alaska down to, all the way to California.
And, you know, they were once quite abundant here
in the Puget Sound.
They've declined quite a bit
from Southeast Alaska to Washington
and here in Washington state,
which is where our work is focused,
populations have dropped by, you know, over 95%
you know, and- - What 95%?
- Yeah, absolutely.
It's hard to find a wild pinto abalone these days.
You know, when you look out on the waters of the Puget Sound
and the Salish Sea, you know,
people think of salmon and orcas
and they're hugely important iconic species in this area,
but there's so much more going on under the surface.
And, you know, there are these super important habitats
that are really foundational, you know, habitats
for this area that are kelp forests
and pinto abalone are a hugely important
part of that ecosystem as well.
- [Chris] To illustrate his point
Ryan takes me to see Seattle Aquarium's
pinto abalone nursery.
Here, baby abalone are raised
and cared for until they're strong enough to thrive
in the Salish Sea on their own,
helping the population recover.
It's amazing to witness this creature as it chomps
marine algae and stray kelp fronds off the sea floor,
effectively cleaning areas for new kelp to anchor and grow.
They're like little master gardeners for these kelp forests
that are home for so many species.
Once these babies grow to about an inch long,
the aquarium divers will release abalone annually.
Joining the team that is working to recover
this endangered species.
- PSRF Puget Sound Restoration Fund,
the organization I work for, you know,
is working with Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.
We work with a lot of other partners, you know,
the Seattle Aquarium recently has joined us
in this big effort to grow out juvenile abalone.
But, you know, we work with Coast Salish tribes
almost, probably more closely than any other groups,
you know, around the Puget Sound.
They're hugely important stakeholders
for the marine resources that we're working to preserve
and restore.
And, you know, it's all tied together
and all of these creatures are related, you know,
and important for the habitats.
And we're part of that as well.
So the pinto abalone help create the habitat
for kelp highways,
and that allows the kelp to do the work of supporting
the larger ecosystem from shading and cooling
the ocean floor to sequestering excess carbon,
to feeding the teems of life underwater.
It's no exaggeration to say that without kelp,
there is no life in the Salish Sea,
whether it's orcas, crabs or harbor seals,
we need kelp to support these gifts.
I learned this from Valerie Segrest
an amazing native nutrition educator
and her husband, Louie Ungaro a native fisherman,
both members of the Muckleshoot tribe.
What is the kelp highway?
- I think of it as this beautiful forest of bullwhip kelp
that folks have traveled along throughout the Salish Sea
and just like any forest,
it provides so much medicine
and habitat and food for the food system.
It's just this incredible piece to the chain,
to the whole entire food chain or web of life.
That that's what the kelp highways all about.
The Kelp Highway Project involving so many, you know,
Coast Salish communities is
not anything new.
We've always been a part active in our food system
and helping to maintain our resources
and not just taking,
but also figuring out some way to give back.
And so I think it's just sustaining our culture
and a good reminder that we are a living culture.
We're not people of the past
and that our ancestors have been doing this
for thousands of years.
I feel really hopeful for the future
because tribes have prioritized education and youth
and more and more priorities are being shifted into
getting them outside, active in their environment,
raising up a generation of natural resource managers
that come with this traditional ecological knowledge
and so I feel incredible hope when I see
youth out being active,
doing things that their ancestors have done.
It's my remedy, you know, is to really witness youth
getting involved and excited about it,
and that empowers them
because it helps them to remember who they are
and where they come from.
And I think that's really the medicine, you know,
that we're all after.
- [Chris] Having lived here for tens of thousands of years,
the Coast Salish people know best what we need
for a healthy Salish Sea.
It is our duty to listen, learn and celebrate
this next generation of leaders
working alongside them to do what's necessary
for generations to come.
Casey, Phoenyx, King, Ryan, and Valerie
are just some of the brilliant and dedicated folks
leading the way and giving us hope.
And if they see a path forward towards a healthy Salish Sea,
then hey, that's reason to celebrate and participate.
(soft music)