Community Control Of Kauaʻi Fishery Shows 'Remarkable' Results

While beavers might seem like a nuisance to many, the Tulalip Tribes in Washington state — after a long legal battle — are relocating the creatures to their lands as a way to create healthy ecosystems. The tribe has spent two years successfully capturing beavers from private lands and moving them with help from the Cascade Forest Conservancy. Their work could become a model for other tribes as a way to reclaim their land management methods.

The Swinomish tribe in Washington state is combining traditional knowledge and science to combat the effects of climate change and improve the health of its land, water, and people. In recent years, their salmon harvest has diminished due to warming waters, but they’ve instituted salmon recovery efforts by restoring tidelands and channels and planting trees along stream beds to cool the waters. Their focus on ecosystem and community health could be a model for other Indigenous tribes looking to create their own climate plans.

A fishing cooperative at the San Ignacio Lagoon protects gray whales that use the lagoon as a nursery by not fishing at that time of the year. Instead, their income comes from ecotourism which brings people close to the whales during that season.

The invasive European green crab was wreaking havoc on the soft-shell clam fishery in Nova Scotia. But fishers, researchers, and park officials worked together to remove as many of them as possible and find an alternative use for them. Their efforts were working: eelgrass meadows and clam populations were rebounding. Now, they’re testing how these crabs can be used in lobster bait, bioplastics, or even fertilizer for gardens.

The Grand Coulee, a 500-foot-tall dam on the Columbia River, nearly eradicated the salmon population that the Colville Tribes relied on, but the Indigenous community initiated a restoration effort to save the fish. They released by hand 100 adult Chinook salmon and scientists were able to confirm that the species was spawning on the upper part of the dam for the first time in 80 years.

As oil rigs stop producing fossil fuels and become decommissioned, many are being repurposed into artificial reefs that support populations of marine wildlife with food and shelter. In the United States, more than 500 oil and gas rigs have been converted into artificial reefs. The California-based company Blue Latitudes has worked to raise awareness about this solution throughout the world, though has struggled to make traction with the Golden State’s oil platforms. Yet, reefing a platform is less expensive than completely removing it.

Fishers, researchers, and managers came together to create Torre Guaceto, a marine reserve off the coast of Italy. The area was previously exploited, but because of this cooperative management project, biodiversity has recovered. Fishers enter the reserve once a week for their catch and usually make up $10,000 a day, which is more than other Mediterranean fishers. While some illegal fishing still happens at night, the dialogue between key stakeholders was crucial to developing the reserve’s sustainable fishing model.

An initiative called the Southeast Alaska Tribal Ocean Research is the state’s first coordinated testing effort to ensure that harvesters are not selling shellfish that contain paralytic shellfish poisoning. The program keeps track of data from 42 beaches in southern Alaska. However, the program only covers a small part of the active fishing sites in the state, so data is limited. But since the testing program was set up, no one at those sites have become sick.

The world's oceans absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, which is a positive thing in the face of climate change for those living on land, but can harm the animals that rely on certain acidification levels of ocean waters. When it became apparent off the coasts of Oregon and Washington that oysters and other sea life with a shell or a skeleton were suffering the ramifications, researchers created a sensor that could detect acidification levels that could warn oyster growers of potentially harmful areas.

Fishermen, scientists, and conservationists in California are teaming up to prevent more humpback whale deaths due to tapping Dungeness crabs that are used in markets and restaurants. The number of whale entanglements from fishing gear and ropes on the West Coast has increased over the years. A new technology known as “ropeless gear” shows promise, which uses acoustics to retrieve traps off the ocean floor, but the cost of the device and other challenges remain. “It’s a great, great step forwards — particularly from the perspective of the whale,” says an attorney from the Center for Biological Diversity.