Saving the Orcas Special Report

[Music] orcas have been in an epic struggle to survive since the 1960s and 1970s [Music] when they were captured and taken out of Puget Sound majestic whales ripped from their natural habitat and held in captivity at theme parks [Music] even after there's capture stopped the whales never recovered we don't have a minute to waste now the orcas left in the wild are facing new threats which could drive them to extinction they need more salmon looks like a turbot the environment is killing chemicals like PCBs lead copper and zinc but there were efforts to protect the lives efforts happening on the water easy thing to do to increase access to salmon is reduce noise and on land and why do we like rain gardens this is a q5 special report saving the orcas here is your host q5 environmental reporter Alison Mauro we live in a very beautiful part of the world and were some of the lucky few who get to see wild orcas right in our own backyard for the next hour we're gonna learn about the challenges facing the southern resident killer whales and what's being done to help them they come here through Elliot Bay looking for chinook salmon their favorite food but those salmon are also declining then there's all the boat noise and that makes it difficult for the whales to find the few fish that remain and finally there's pollution in the water that's making the whales sick with these very real challenges it is possible we will see the southern resident killer whales disappear in our own lifetimes the Salish Sea is like a water highway with all kinds of traffic creating all kinds of noise and because southern resident killer whales use sound to locate their food all the boat noise makes it hard for them to hunt killer whales echolocate their prey using sonar to find fish and capture it as well as communicate with each other and any loud noise can interrupt those signals and what we're finding is that harro Strait and the Salish Sea is noisy enough that whales are losing 62 percent of their opportunities to communicate over the background noise on a typical day and on a really busy day they can actually lose up to 97% of their opportunities to communicate over meaningful ranges Rob Williams founded ocean's initiative and he's been studying the southern resident killer whales since 2003 he says there's no easy fix the problem started decades ago when captures for theme parks removed whales that could have reproduced and hurt the whales social dynamics but since the captures stopped decades ago the whales still aren't recovering the way they should Williams and other experts say that's because of polluted water a lack of prey and boat no Williams says when votes are around the whales can lose at least a quarter of their hunting opportunity but we must not lose sight of the bigger picture which is that the noise can only bias and buy the whales some time while we recover chinook salmon stocks Williams says that scientists estimate the whales need about a 30% increase in chinook salmon numbers that haven't been seen since the 1980s we've seen a lot of political will over the last few years to protect this population but we've also seen a lot of finger-pointing it's the salmon it's this one Dam it's this one industry or this one the source of noise and in fact what our science is showing is that it's all of it and in fact we cannot get to the recovery target without mitigating all the threats all at once one goal for recovery is helping the orcas birth at least one new calf each year for the next ten years but those calves also have to survive and the majority recently have died these whales are resilient and they're clever and if you give them a fighting chance they can recover but we don't have a minute to waste a lot of attention has been focused on the whale watch industry in fact the governor's task force to recover the southern resident killer whales proposed a ban on whale watching of these orcas but legislators never passed it some say that the whale watch boats add a considerable amount of stress to the orcas while others say the whale watch industry is unfairly blamed this group of high-school students is in David Bane's favorite kind of classroom there's only so much he can get out of reading books Spain is an acoustic scientist who was once considered an adversary of whale watching boats like the one he's on he studied this southern resident killer whales and his research prompted changes in the industry the boats stay farther away and go slower so the whales can find their food killer whales put out a click and they hear the echo coming back off this as you can imagine that Necco coming back is very faint so if there's too much noise they can't hear the echo beam says scientists have found that when it's really loud the whales just give up looking for fish but nowadays whale watch boats are not his biggest concern I worry about most or small boats they're going fast you know they may not even be aware the whales are their boats like this one which the whale watch boat tried to warn of the gray whales nearby we were pretty clear that something was going on and he did not slow down at all and you can see his wake is right over there near where those whales are feeding you know that floats off in the distance it's still probably louder where the great whales are then this boat is but critics say that instead of warning smaller boats the whale watch boats draw more attention to the whales by attracting other boats with people hoping to catch a sight of them a short term is reduce noise on a Sandstrom is founder of the whale trail a land-based viewing option for whale watching Sam Sturm was part of a movement to try to ban whale watch boats from following the southern resident killer whales with all the different kinds of boat noise in the Sailor see the whale watch industry often says it's unfairly singled out can argue the fact that we are out here on a vessel we are you know going through the water creating noise you know I would argue our presence is mitigated by you know the education that we do we're in essence the front line between the public and orca whales and we're creating almost a relationship and people get to go out and experience orcas and learn about the whales in the wildlife and and you know ways they can help the whales Christopher hankies family owns Puget Sound Express and this boat has special technology that makes it one of the fastest but also one of the quietest in the Pacific whale watch Association like many others he says noise is an issue because there are so few salmon for the southern resident killer whales to locate I think orca whales are part of the salmon story and I think the biggest hope for everybody is that we can restore salmon habitat and and maintain you know our native salmon species voters should expect to see more law enforcement on the water this summer especially off the coast of San Juan Islands which is one of the favorite places the southern resident killer whales look for food the rules for voters have changed this year and Wildlife police officers will be out enforcing them we never really know what we're gonna see out here on a given day some days we'll see stellar sea lions some days we'll see different birds deer and and such on the islands but most of the time we're looking for marine mammals like the southern resident life is about to get busier grouper mufon you up there for this state wildlife police team looks like a tour boat as the weather gets nicer and more people are out on the water they plan to be there as well having vessels get too close to the killer whales has been a problem for quite some time we worry about in a worst-case scenario prop strikes which haven't been known to happen but we always worry about it and also the cumulative noise of vessels being in close proximity to the whales sergeant Russ Mullen says officers with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife are mostly focused on operators of recreational boats and fishing boats who may not be aware there are whales around them boat noise hurts the orcas ability to hunt because they use echolocation to find fish and that echo is drowned out by boats quiet is so important for the endangered orcas that state law is now changing to protect them the changes to the existing law are going to be the addition of a 1/2 nautical mile go slow zone around southern resident killer whales as well as expanding the no-go perimeter around the whales from 200 to 300 yards on the sides and 400 yards in front and behind the killer whales if they're traveling voters could face fines but sergeant Mullen says they prefer education these orcas can travel all the way from Southern California to southeast Alaska education like what naturalist Bart Rulon does on this whale watching boat the cornerstone of Orca research and other whale research is being able to identify individual animals while we were with him near orcas island we saw transient killer whales hunting a sea lion rule on captured photos that show the orcas in action transient killer whales eat marine mammals and have plenty of food which is why boat noise is not as much of an issue for them and why Rulon is seen a lot more of these orcas it's also why he says they've seen less of the southern residents who only eat fish almost exclusively chinook salmon that are also dwindling in numbers it's all about the food with these orcas that's what the residents need they need more salmon and that's what these transients are benefiting about right now it's amazing how much more we see the transients so just how noisy is it under water and how does scientists measure that well one group has placed hydrophones underwater recording devices around Puget Sound and all of us can listen to them live online as the boats are moving through we're on the Edmonds pier a fishing pier and I've got a hydrophone and underwater microphone dangling down here like a fishing line this is one of the areas the southern resident killer whales often visit when they come to Puget Sound we have killer whales who are acoustic specialists living basically in the shipping lanes Scott beers is coordinator of Orca sounds hydrophone network the underwater acoustic monitoring system is shown just how noisy it is when the southern residents come here looking for food noise comes in lots of variety small recreational boats big cargo ships and of course the ferry system you see the ferries leaving the dock now the noise level is increasing so now we're above 130 decibels now it's more than 133 so now we're at 136 decibels plus they don't just contend with one boat at a time the sort of the lower frequency chugging of the distant ferry and then a higher buzz from this powerboat probably now add in a tree I automatically make my voice a little louder so that you can hear me over the train whistle just like us the orcas have to talk louder to which may cause stress sometimes it's so noisy they just give up looking for food their preferred prey chinook salmon are decreasing in number and much harder to find than a few decades ago and that's why quiet is so important the easy thing to do to increase access to salmon is reduce noise he says quieting that traffic will make a big difference once you start turning the propeller in a way that causes this thing called cavitation cavitation makes this really high frequency hissing sound that's important for the killer whales because their high-frequency specialists and they click at frequencies that are well above what we can hear anything you can do to keep a propeller from cavitating will be helpful to the whales he's starting to hear the Kingston ferry coming in for veers all the other problems are still important to fix like salmon habitat recovery and reducing pollution the good news about noise in the ocean is that if you remove the source you core you quiet the source the pollution goes away pollution is poisoning the southern resident killer whales coming up will tell you where it's coming from and what's being done to clean it up [Music] every time we drive down the road our cars leave behind tiny particles of pollution from our brakes our tires and the exhaust and when it rains that pollution flows into Puget Sound and that builds up in the fat stores of the southern resident killer whales but the roads are not the only problem Seattle's working waterfront is also a challenge you can see all the creosote pilings that are there they're still leaching toxics into our waters whether it's these toxic wood pilings or chemicals leaching from a scrap metal recycling facility Seattle's working waterfront is a focus for Puget Sound keeper and a lot of people think of stormwater they think of roadways and parking lots and rooftops and things like that but it's also industrial sites and so the site over here and some of the ones behind me over here have been out of compliance with their stormwater permit Chris Wilkie is executive director of the nonprofit that investigates water polluters focused here on contaminants that can have lethal effects on marine life there are chemicals like PCBs lead copper and zinc at very high levels that are not safe for marine life one of the key measures of that is whether or not it's safe to eat the fish and we are going by right here to the right of the boat is a public fishing pier that has signs on it innate language that's saying it's not safe to eat the fish southern resident killer whales are often called some of the most contaminated marine mammals on earth their fat is filled with toxic slike PCBs and when they don't have enough to eat they metabolize that fat and that poison ends up in their blood start with the small microscopic organisms and then tiny shrimp-like zooplankton on up to herring on up to salmon and then on up to orcas and people at every step of that food chain those pollutants accumulate into eventually by time you get to an orca whale it's extremely unhealthy for the animal but it's even unhealthy for the salmon and the herring as well here at Seattle iron and metals of fire last year caused even more concern Puget Sound keeper recently reached a million dollar settlement with the auto recite forcing them to make changes to protect the waterway Wilkie says they're celebrating but also critical of all the battles they have to fight and the state is really not living up to their mandate a lot of the toxic contamination issues that we have with our salmon in our orcas it can really be traced to the fact that the state of Washington is not enforcing the Clean Water Act to the extent that they should and when citizen groups like ours are able to step up and enforce industries into compliance that's a good thing but it shouldn't be falling on us to do this this is this is really the central job of the state the port says that it's done a lot to clean up the waterfront out here here's poor Commissioner Fred Feldman study of killer whales was my motivation for the public service and I'm proud of what the Port of Seattle has done to restore some of the polluted sites that they inherited we're not making marine sanctuaries but we are making life better for both the whales and the people who depend on the marine environment we have over eight maureen parks that provide public access for the public but also cleaned up the water so it becomes more swimmable more fishable but still we have a long way to go our wastewater flows into Puget Sound in both treated and untreated forms and microbes like fungus and bacteria and other parasites make it into the marine environment so scientists want to know how those microbes are affecting the southern resident orcas whenever a southern resident killer whale comes up for a breath its sprays a mist into the air it's a plume of valuable information that contain material from their lungs and their respiratory tract and we hope to capture that on this nylon mesh if we're lucky and then we'll close it back up again and after that we'll extract the droplets that are stuck to the mesh Linda Rhoads is a microbiologist with NOAA who is part of a team that's trying to understand how the killer whales are impacted by the tiniest of problems microscopic organisms that are invisible to the human eye the lack of food is often a focus of recovery for the orcas who depend on chinook salmon which are also Wendling a number it's possible the disease making the whales less likely to eat or even more vulnerable to infection they carry a lot of parasitic worms in their intestinal tract and it's not a surprise because these particular kinds of parasitic worms also infect salmon and they actually need both the fish and the mammal for that parasitic worm to complete its life cycle three years ago 20 year old male ell 95 was found dead from an infection that started at the site of a satellite tag and researchers admitted they hadn't followed proper disinfecting protocol started with the skin and spread to the lungs and we figured out what species of fungus that is and it's a fungus that is very invasive once it gets inside of the animal and actually it's a fungus that also infects humans and when it's in humans it's a very bad situation l 95 s death showed scientists that infections may be a challenge for recovery of the whales who often show signs of a mysterious condition called peanut-head before they die Rhodes team is trying to trace the connection between the health of the whales and our wastewater this malfunction at King County's Magnolia treatment facility in 2017 released hundreds of millions of gallons of untreated waste but even on a rainy day there's a lot of human waste entering Puget Sound and a sailor seat I was looking at a study where on one day in October in 2016 just from the city of Seattle somewhere on the order of a hundred and fifty million gallons got dumped into Puget Sound through these combined sewer overflows or CSO s and the estimate for Vancouver BC is something on the order of 12 billion gallons of untreated waste in some cases roads team has found detectable human fecal material far offshore and deep in the water indicating our more urban waters are far more contaminated it's our responsibility to understand what we are doing because we are the one thing that can change the southern resident killer whales are often called some of the most contaminated marine mammals on earth and it's because they spend a lot of time in urban waterways like this so every other year scientists survey fish all around where sitting right now to test them for toxic contaminants it's a beautiful day on Elliot Bay but if this fish survey teaches you anything it's that what you see on the surface doesn't tell the whole tale this net is about to pull up fish who live near the floor of Puget Sound fish you are exposed to contaminants in the sediment there's a specific herring these are spawning in Elliot Bay Jim West in a team with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife have been doing these surveys for nearly 30 years we got about four or five species of soul in here and we're trying to pick up the ones that were called English soul there's a escape once the fish are sorted and the rest returned to the water the English soul are put in a holding tank it represents what's happening on the sea floor in the sediments a lot of contaminants end up in the sediments and so we want a species that's living there and feeding in the sediments but in the sediments the contaminant loads in Puget Sound are pretty much in the urban areas so we can find English saw out in the middle of Puget Sound that are really clean but as soon as you move into a place like Elliot Bay here they're highly contaminated West says in seven of ten survey sites and contaminants are either not declining or getting worse over the course of our lives the more we eat the more it accumulates and whatever if we eat a fish where we are then in consuming and accumulating what the fish is he and so as you move up the food chain you get higher and higher concentrations of these biofuels contaminants senior research scientist sandy O'Neil calls the fish an indicator species that gives early warning signs of the health of Puget Sound they're tested for chemicals use decades ago like PCBs as well as what are called contaminants of emerging concern like pharmaceuticals when you get a prescription you go to the pharmacist you know the first thing that pharmacist does it's a looks at your list of medications and tells you is that okay to take this medication without medication the fish don't have that option they're just they're getting exposed to a whole slew of them all at once the scientists have found compounds that model estrogen are likely causing male fish to produce female egg yolk protein and that includes salmon a favorite food for the southern resident orcas it throws off their hormone balance and it could affect their ability to reproduce the long-term monitoring data that we produce can be used to document effectiveness of any management actions that are implemented so we're going to see declines in contaminant levels in herring and juvenile salmonids before we're going to see declines and contaminants and killer whales so there will be our early warning indicator species that things are getting better or worse cities all around Western Washington are starting to take inventory of their effects on the southern resident orcas in fact shoreline just became the first city in Washington state to become salmon safe certified and they're second in the country only to Portland but it did not come without its share of mistakes and lessons learned shorelines new city hall building was meant to be a beacon of environmental advocacy we built in a number of environmental features the green roof on top of city council chambers have plants that filter the rain and slow it down before it goes into our stormwater system there's hot water heated by the Sun on top of the council chambers and on top of the parking garage there's a huge solar array to generate electricity but after it was finished city officials learned the building was actually bad for salmon we built the building to meet up to a very high level of industry standards but that standards didn't take into account stormwater and it was when we started looking more at water quality and salmon protections that we realized that the building itself was a source of stormwater pollution that needed to be treated shoreline mayor will hall showed us the problem the buildings outside walls are coated in zinc and zinc is toxic for fish like the chinook salmon that make up the main prey for endangered southern resident killer whales that's when shoreline decided to get even stricter with its building codes community wants to see salmon and orca whales in the future and so they're demanding that our local governments do its part so we're looking for ways to become better for the environment and the salmon safe certification is the program that's helping us learn to do better now the second city in the entire country to be certified salmon safe new infrastructure will have to follow stricter building codes the city is also focusing on green infrastructure like this Park designed to trap stormwater and filter contaminants just like these rain gardens on Aurora Avenue we've watched this region grow for the past five decades all of that growth is having an impact every time a car drives down the road it leaves little bits of its tires little bits of its brake pads little bits of its exhaust and then when it rains that rain carries all of that pollution into Puget Sound and that's part of what's killing our salmon and killing the ecosystem so people in this community are saying enough is enough they want us to clean up the environment and that's what's driving our City Council to take these steps Paul says they're committed to do whatever they can here in shoreline whether it's a short sidewalk built with material that traps stormwater or a big park that reminds everyone of the future they want to see my hope is that here in the city of shoreline will learn to make all of our practices safe for the salmon and that other cities around the region will follow suit and that our children and grandchildren will be able to go salmon fishing and watch the orca whales just like we did when we were kids lack of food is the number one threat to the survival of the southern resident killer whales coming up will tell you why salmon are disappearing and what we can all do to save them and the orcas who depend on them [Music] so far this hour we've learned about how noise and pollution are hurting the southern resident killer whales but the main challenge to their survival is a lack of food you see these orcas don't eat other marine mammals or sharks like other orcas do they only eat fish in their favorite food chinook salmon are also declining so the story of saving the orcas is really a story of saving salmon first we're gonna go to the Skagit River one of the most important rivers for salmon in the Puget Sound region in the middle of the Skagit River somewhere near Mount Vernon there's a hut looking structure floating on the brown water it's a fish trap where each morning state wildlife technicians check to see what's been caught we operate it from January through mid-july to count juvenile salmon as they're migrating towards the Puget Sound Clayton Kinsel is a biologist with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and his team is mostly counting chum salmon right now some three to four thousand each night southern resident killer whales do eat but scientists believe their diet depends on chinook salmon and like killer whales chinook salmon runs are dwindling this fish trap is helping scientists figure out how to stop that tells us how many fish are coming downstream to the Puget Sound so it's a tool that we used to set fisheries and manage fisheries to inform habitat restoration in the lower river habitat restoration the two words you'll hear more than most when it comes to chinook salmon recovery especially here on the Skagit River where dikes and levees have cut off side streams that are important for young salmon trying to grow bigger and stronger for their journey to the ocean these are places where the river used to flow many years ago and they're now cut off as a result those places are now inaccessible to juvenile salmon moving down the river Cory green is a federal scientist with NOAA's National Marine fishery science center instead of a well manicured river with a road right next to it he showed me what young salmon need to survive as you look down stream you can see a big pile of wood and those areas provide safe places for our salmon tahrir and then these little spots right here this little pond that's another place where salmon can duck in this land is what green and other scientists call a freshwater floodplain it's important for salmon but it also makes for great agricultural land and Scenic River Front properties the Skagit has lost more than 50% of its floodplains and chinook salmon runs are just 10% of what they once were a pretty large wild population the largest in Puget Sound nevertheless these you've got less habitat for rearing salmon to use as their bulking up and as a consequence they compete with each other and so that lost habitat means lost production of adults down the line it's on rivers like the Skagit where scientists and others are trying to figure out a balance so we can produce food for hungry humans and food for hungry whales it's gonna take a long time to feel the effects of recovery and so there's some short-term solutions people can take and there's going to be longer-term ones and if we want to have a population of salmon to feed those orcas we need to think about the long term as well as the short term and those long term solutions really are about habitats you just saw the importance of the habitats upriver but the part of the Skagit River that empties into the sound called the estuary is also vital habitat for salmon it's where salmon take even more time to grow up big enough to venture out to the ocean the channels give safe habitat filled with food for growing Chinook but areas like this have decreased by 80% right now the area's carrying capacity is about 1.5 million Chinook and scientists want to increase that by 60 percent that will mean restoring hundreds of acres and protecting existing habitat like this right now I'm a seventh generation you know from my ancestors at the treaty signing time and I don't think they could ever imagine you know what things could have changed - looking at the landscapes they are now it's a societal experiment and we'll see if society is willing to change their change behavior enough to do the work to protect the habitat to restore enough habitat to achieve some recovery goals there is so much habitat to restore for salmon that some estimate it could take 90 to 100 years so some farmers are stepping up and taking the lead and one of them is helping restore salmon habitat in the South sounds most important river system jerseys are known as some of the best dairy cows but they're also known for their personalities jerseys are very curious if there's a gate open it won't be just one the logo John van war against granddad bought the farm in 1936 his father describes the nearby creeks decades ago as full of salmon I'd like to bring it back to that the idea was with with doing this project was to make it so my grandkids my grandkids kids would be able to see that very thing so the organic dairy with the curious cows is now the site of one of King County's latest salmon habitat restoration projects crews excavated this side channel of Boise Creek one of the most important habitats for wild spring chinook Boise Creek is the only stream in King County that provides habitat for Spring Run Chinook which is one of the most rare runs of salmon in Puget Sound so we are very keen on restoring and enhancing the habitat in this stream in particular so we don't lose that fish run to extinction Josh Kahn says Boise Creek was channeled decades ago for agriculture and the water often moved too fast to allow young fish the time to grow properly and if there were high flows they could get flushed out into the white river way before they were old enough to survive their migration out to Puget Sound so having them stay in this stream system for as long as possible was really helpful to them in terms of maximizing their potential to survive it's why projects like this are focusing on partnerships with farms and private landowners to restore hundreds of miles of river habitat in King County we're trying to do everything we can to protect the salmon protect the water protect the ground that we farm and hopefully this would show that well that's exactly what we're trying to do habitat is not the only challenge facing salmon recovery seals and sea lions eat the fish and compete with the orcas for food which has some calling for the killing of the marine mammals to save the orcas one by one they were all found dead more than a dozen sea lions shot many in the head washed up around Puget Sound last year mostly in West Seattle sea lions and seals are often seen as adversaries of fishermen a recent paper published by federal scientist shows that in Puget Sound seals and sea lions eat twice as much chinook salmon as southern resident killer whales and catch six times more chinook salmon and recreational and commercial fishermen combined here at NOAA's Manchester lab scientists are learning more about another kind of fish that may unlock new information to save salmon so we've been studying the survival of steelhead smolts as they migrate through Puget Sound and trying to figure out why they are dying as they make the brief migration from the river mouths to the ocean barry baricza Kian is a supervisory research fisheries biologist with NOAA's National Marine Fisheries Science Center they've injected acoustic transmitters in steelhead that are detected by hydrophones on the floor of Puget Sound they've also put detectors on harbor seals to see how they interact with the steelhead in some cases they found the fish transmitters where harbor seals spend time on land indicating they are eating the fish but they noticed some years the seals ate more and some years they ate less and the scientists believe it's connected to abundance of what's called forage fish and these other prey resources such as herring and anchovies and other bottom fish they're much higher in fat and much more abundant so we think that seals and other things that prey on steelhead and salmon would prefer to eat those if they were abundant and when they're abundant at this lab scientists believe seals and sea lions would prefer smaller forage fish but those fish aren't always here Berra Jian says they've started to see a connection between warmer water and an increase in anchovies and anchovies less steelhead are eaten by seals and sea lions essentially what we're saying is that if we're right about this and that predation is greater on salmon and steelhead when other forage fish and other fish abundance is low then really what we're talking about is restoration of the Puget Sound ecosystem to support these other prey species while scientists are studying the problem of credit in habitat loss hatcheries are producing more chinook salmon to try to make up what's been lost Governor Inslee has included 12 million dollars in his operating budget to increase the amount of chinook salmon produced at state hatcheries but simply raising more fish is not enough hatcheries are having to change the way they operate to make sure more fish survive and make it to the whales it may look like a waterpark amusement ride for salmon but this is the way hatchery Chinook are marked for identification when they return to Puget Sound as adults their adipose fin is clipped and 200,000 of them will also be injected with identification tags you solve the salmon problem is the same problem that's trying to solve the Orca problem it's all in two woven it's not just one piece we're gonna fix whale of Salmon Hatchery assistant manager Jesse Rood and his colleagues are working to improve the health and survival of the fish they release instead of releasing them all at one time which is standard protocol they're now experimenting with three release dates by changing water temperatures and how much the fish are fed so we got three different programs early normal and late and early SAR going to be released here in a couple weeks the normal growth or would be released in June and the lake before we be released in August governor Inslee has included 12 million dollars in his budget for increased hatchery fish production and by the rate that they grow in the hatchery and win their release that can affect how many come back and how big they are like they might stay in the ocean an extra year and come back as a larger adult and that's what we're trying to come up with but studies have shown that hatchery fish can have a negative impact on wild fish if special precautions are taken making sure we're not just dumping fish into a system with a bunch of wild fish and they're both competing for food and just making sure that we're not out playing anything and if we are if we are having effect what exactly are our effects and are the adverse effects or is the effect not really creating any major issues trevor Jennison manages one of the state hatcheries producing all that extra chinook to help feed the southern resident killer whales fish that come back it's if they're 80% hatchery fish right it's just the way it is and if we don't rear hatchery fish well and effectively then you know we're not doing a service to do the whales to the fishermen anything and and at the same time what we ultimately want to get to the point where we have wild fish Michael Schmitt is deputy director of long live the Kings a group that's studying why threatened fish like salmon and steelhead aren't making it out of Puget Sound to the open ocean where they grow to adulthood some argue though that even if we produce more fish in hatcheries it won't make much of a difference until we take down barriers like dams that prevent fish from migrating up and down rivers and one of the most controversial set of dams is on the lower Snake River those four dams are blamed for reducing salmon numbers on the snake and Columbia River systems they slow water which increases temperatures and makes young salmon more susceptible to predators critics say the dams are losing money and don't produce enough power to make them worth it but the river system is used by wheat farmers to transport grain and lawmakers in those areas have argued the dams should stay in place governor jay Inslee has signed a bill that provides seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars to study how to help impacted communities if the Snake River dams are breached both sides are critical of spending more money on studying the dams but those who want to keep them say the decision is a federal one and the state is just wasting its money those who want to remove the dam say there have been enough studies and no more are needed while the Snake River dams have received the most attention they are not the only dams that hurt salmon in fact right here in the Puget Sound area there are several hundred miles of habitat cut off the fish because of dams but two of them recently got a lot of funding to make some big changes my dad was a commercial fisherman who ended up owning a fish processing plant up in Blaine for Bellingham Mayor Kelly Linville this dam is personal it cuts off salmon habitat at the Middle Fork of the Nooksack River so the fish come up they get to the dam and they can't swim over the dam right so they have to stop April McEwen is the project manager for American rivers helping to spearhead work to remove the dam while still maintain some diversion for Bellingham's water supply it'll open up 16 miles of historic habitat for salmon in clean cold water flowing from Mount Baker so it's going to be smart infrastructure that allows the water diversion to be maintained while we remove the dam so we're gonna then remove the dam and restore access and fish passage restore the channel through the site and restore access upstream habitat here on the White River salmon are getting a different kind of solution downstream from the mud mountain dam will soon be the largest fish trap in North America so the existing fish trap was designed to pass up to 20,000 fish per year we've used it to pass more than that but it still isn't supporting the massive number of fish returns that we're seeing yearly so the new fish passage has been designed to pass 1.25 million per year and up to 60,000 fish per day US Army Corps of Engineers project manager Leah Hahn Steen says it was designed by more than 150 engineers from five different organizations so if we didn't have a trap here with our dam we would have a loss of tens of miles to hundreds of miles of habitat we would have fish runs that are much lower than they currently are and they might actually go extinct there may not be enough habitat for some of these fish fish biologist Fred gefs explained how it works the fish swim up a ladder and into the trap then a truck will move them upstream and release them above the dam again in an area with pristine water perfect for salmon flowing off Mount Rainier we are just one River Basin a 14 that you'd find in the Puget Sound but this is one of the most important basins it's one of the largest it has spring chinook salmon which is one of the preferred kinds of salmon that Orca eats this project will cost one hundred and twelve million dollars but that money is already secured back here on the Nooksack though funding is still unsure as the project waits for state and the state has said that this is a top-priority project so actions speak louder than words and we believe that the state will deliver on this critics of governor Inslee's budget say it doesn't do enough for salmon habitat restoration which they say could take a hundred years of current funding levels aren't increased advocates for the project here on the Nooksack say it could increase salmon runs by 31% it's a great opportunity to not let generations of children think that every River should be dammed up next we'll show you how helping the southern resident orcas may start right in your own backyard [Music] the problems facing the southern resident killer whales can feel overwhelming and it can be hard to imagine that regular people just like you and me can make a difference but that's exactly what we're about to show you and we'll start right here in West Seattle just look for you know like a fluttering tail in the water or a lot of times they they see you first and they'll dart around as they just watch the water years of fishing have prepared volunteer Dennis Hinton for his daily checks of fauntleroy Creek I feel very childlike I mean I mean really I like a kid in the candy store for decades the creek was essentially dead it served as a drainage ditch with dirty water that fish couldn't even swim up the way of many urban streams and urban stormwater is lethal to coho salmon this video shows what happens when coho are put in the toxic mix of runoff they gasp for breath and eventually die what happens in the ocean happens in the ocean we cannot control it but what we can control is the health of the habitat for juveniles Judy Pickens bought the property several decades ago but admits she didn't initially want to get into salmon habitat restoration thanks to her willingness and a lot of volunteers new vegetation a fish ladder and other improvements have turned the once dirty drainage ditch into a creek that welcomes dozens and sometimes hundreds of coho every year they are great advertisement for the major environmental work that is going on and needs to go on outside of the city though this Creek is home to coho its chinook salmon that make up the main prey for the southern resident killer whales but coho are often seen as an indicator for salmon health which is why Pickens looks at the creek in her backyard as an important messenger for all salmon they will recognize that salmon are critical to orcas whether those salmon are chinook or Chum it it doesn't really matter they're salmon it's a simple message seminar important so how do we keep them here so I'll do a couple of scoops here and see what we come up with we didn't find any fish on our search but Hinton will be back tomorrow just like he is every day this is not the Columbia River obviously but but it's it's a little something that we could do you know and feel real good about and feel close to nature and and and in our own miniscule way saving the world you know one fish at a time follow roy creek here in west seattle is a small urban waterway but the Ship Canal that runs under the Aurora bridge is huge and the roadway above it is a real problem the stormwater running off of it when it rains looks like coffee and it's toxic for marine life but the area under the bridge is now getting a makeover with rain gardens that trap and filter stormwater so that it is much cleaner when it finally flows into Puget Sound rain gardens are one of the main ways scientists say we can clean up stormwater runoff and reduce the amount of pollution in Puget Sound that's hurting the Orcas and we're never too young to get started as one group of elementary school students in Tacoma recently learned careful careful it may look and even feel like recess the kids like to play in the dirt but this group of students at Sherman Elementary School in Tacoma is working on a class project we ready they're building a rain garden with the help of a couple adults mulch is an important thing to keep the weeds from growing it keeps moisture around the plants and why do we like rain gardens because they help Orcas rob kraebel is with defenders of wildlife and this frenzy of digging in dirt is part of a program called orcas love rain garden right here okay it'll filter stormwater runoff from their school's roof and keep it from flowing down drains and into Puget Sound just like this rain garden the largest of its kind in the world right now what it's raining this fills and it's black like tar and if you were to touch it it's sticky at times to the point of one day I might have done that and had to wash my hands three or four times to get the the stickiness off of it Jessica Knickerbocker spearheaded the construction of the Point Defiance urban rain garden which filters stormwater from 750 surrounding acres on an average rainy day that adds up to 8 million gallons of filtered stormwater most of the city of tacoma doesn't provide water quality treatment of its storm water sewer before it goes into Puget Sound so all of the dirty contaminants from our roads and cars and homes goes basically in our pipes and out depreciates sound untreated the rain garden at Sherman Elementary is smaller but no less important all of these students are going to become the next generation of leaders in Tacoma and Washington and green stormwater infrastructure is a low cost and in my opinion common-sense thing to do to reduce our impact on Puget Sound salmon and orcas so it's important to get these kids to start thinking about how what we do up here on land is connected to what happens in the ocean as soon as possible protecting orcas and their habitats may seem daunting like an insurmountable challenge would it make you sad if they disappear but if we can learn anything from these students all right you guys spread that out make it look good it's that working together is the best way to start Ragan is there anything more fun for a kid than playing in the dirt no no does that mean that protecting the environment can actually be fun yeah it's if you love animals like orcas and stuff like that it could really be fun because they're helping those animals last year the world watched as j35 one of the mothers pushed her dead calf around Puget Sound for two weeks and then soon after that j-51 of the calves died that's why this year the birth of two new calves one in the El pod and one of the J pod have given people a lot of hope it's shown that the whales have not given up yet and neither should we [Music] to call the southern resident killer whales iconic is an understatement for some they're a vital part of this ecosystem and for others they're a symbol of great beauty the Lummi tribe even believes the orcas are their ancestors when I started covering the southern resident killer whales several years ago it was during the baby boom when several adorable calves were born but since then I've written both the birth announcements and the obituaries for the very same whales in just a few years I believe the story of the southern resident killer whales has shown us both the worst and the best about us but the question is how will the story end I believe we're witnessing a great moment in history and history will be our judge again I'm Alison Mauro thanks for watching [Music]

Channel: KING 5 Seattle

Views: 52,842

Keywords: southern residents, killer whales, orcas, marine mammals, chinook salmon, salmon, pollution, boat noise, puget sound, elliott bay, haro strait, news, environment, whale watching

Id: hiRN15qaiUE

Length: 49min 41sec (2981 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 04 2019