Grant Will Aid Bringing Sea Otters Back To Oregon

Tribal Chairman Delores Pigsley of the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians (CTSI) has announced that the Tribe has been awarded a three-year $1.56 million grant from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) to support Tribal efforts to return sea otters to the Oregon and Northern California coasts. The grant is through the America the Beautiful Challenge, a partnership between the U.S. Department of the Interior, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the U.S. Department of Defense, Native Americans in Philanthropy, and NFWF. The competitive grant awards were made possible with funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, Inflation Reduction Act, other federal conservation programs, and private sources.

The project is entitled Bringing Xvlh-t’vsh Home: Indigenous-led Planning for Sea Otters’ Return to the Oregon and Northern California Coast. “I am pleased that after years of collaboration with the Elakha Alliance and others, we will now be able to take steps with other Tribal nations and partner organizations to return this culturally important

species to their ancient home,” said Pigsley. She added, “This funding will enable us to build capacity and expertise to lead or participate in sea otter reintroduction and management and to elevate the role of coastal Indian Tribes in marine stewardship.”

The grant will support additional planning and technical capacity within CTSI as well as the

Confederated Tribes of the Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians (CTCLUSI); the Yurok Tribe; the Tolowa Dee-ni’ Nation (TDN); and other regional partners and collaborators. The Tribes and partners will produce a plan for reintroducing sea otters to the Oregon and Northern California coasts. The project will also focus on building support for sea otter reintroduction from coastal Tribes, ocean stakeholders and coastal communities in the region; completing key scientific studies; and conducting socio-economic assessments of potential reintroduction sites in the region.

Pigsley noted that, “Indian people of coastal Oregon and Northern California referred to sea otters by many different words. These many names reflect their presence and importance to our people. We now know that they enabled rich marine and estuarine ecosystems that provided food and materials our ancestors needed for life. This grant will help us to bring these relatives home.”

Sea otters have long been recognized as a keystone species that promotes the biological productivity and ecological resilience of nearshore and estuarine ecosystems. Sea otters were once plentiful from Alaska south to Baja, but have been absent from Oregon for more than a century due to the maritime fur trade. With kelp forests declining at an alarming rate due to ocean warming and over-predation by sea urchins, sea otter reintroduction is considered part of a long-term solution to restore and maintain healthy nearshore ecosystems in Oregon. In estuaries, sea otters protect eelgrass habitat by keeping

populations of small crabs, including invasive green crabs, under control.