For The Wild - KURT RUSSO on the People Under the Sea [ENCORE] ⧸345

00:00:00.240 Hello for the wild community. It is with a heavy heart that we share that Tokatai, a

00:00:06.440 Southern resident orca held unjustly in captivity for 53 years, has passed away. To honor her

00:00:14.120 memory, this week we are rebroadcasting our episode with Kurt Russo on The People Under

00:00:19.300 the Sea, originally aired in October of 2018. This conversation explores the powerful memory

00:00:26.160 held by southern resident orcas, the threats they face from vessel noise, chemical pollutants,

00:00:32.200 and declining Chinook salmon population, the health of the Salish Sea, and the efforts of

00:00:37.500 the Lummi Nation to return Skelechuctanut, also known as Tokatai or Lolita, from where she was

00:00:43.320 being held captive at Miami Seaquarium to her natal waters in the Salish Sea. Tokatai's life

00:00:48.960 ended while in captivity, but we hope that her memory may serve to inspire the fight for right

00:00:54.640 relationship and reciprocity with our more-than-human kin.

00:01:15.800 Hello and welcome to For the Wild podcast. I'm Ayanna Young. Today we are speaking with Kurt

00:01:22.500 Russo. Kurt has worked on environmental issues, land preservation, and treaty rights with the

00:01:29.140 Lummi Nation for 40 years. He is a senior strategist for the Lummi Nation Sovereignty

00:01:34.560 and Treaty Protection Office, coordinating the Lummi Nation's Salish Sea Campaign and the Tokatai

00:01:41.460 Repatriation Project. He is also the executive director of the Foundation for Indigenous Medicine

00:01:47.700 and former director of the Native American Land Conservancy.

00:01:52.500 He holds a BS and MS in forestry and a PhD in history.

00:01:57.900 Well, thank you so much, Kurt, for joining us today.

00:02:01.420 And before I begin, I would just like to extend the deepest of gratitude from all of us at

00:02:07.900 Fur the Wild for the passionate and moving work you are doing on behalf of the Southern

00:02:13.820 resident orcas and in working to bring Tokatai back home to her natal waters and relatives who

00:02:19.700 await her. Thank you. And it feels only right that we begin our More Than Human theme month

00:02:26.260 in honor of the mother orca, Taliqua, who carried her dead calf on a tour of grief for more than

00:02:33.340 a thousand miles over a 17-day period. And it's a profound reminder that we share our place and

00:02:41.320 experience with other beings that bear memory whose capacity for love and loss mirror our own

00:02:48.260 and it also highlights the uncertainty of the southern residents livelihood and quite frankly

00:02:54.160 the livelihood of our planetary community if we continue to act with reckless abandon

00:02:59.540 and i see taliqua's act as a communicative plea to our humanity as an acute demonstration of the

00:03:07.780 wisdom that these kin possess. So could you begin by sharing with us what Lummi cosmology

00:03:15.740 might make of this happening and what place orcas occupy within Lummi cosmology more broadly?

00:03:24.400 Cosmology is one of those words that sort of, you sort of drop back into your eyes,

00:03:28.680 if you know what I mean. I can tell you what I've been told about those questions.

00:03:33.460 there was a time

00:03:35.460 and there was a lemme word for this

00:03:37.960 in their cosmology

00:03:39.420 which is spelled

00:03:41.260 E-L-H

00:03:43.980 N-E-X-W 1.00

00:03:45.600 T-E-X-W

00:03:47.460 and that refers

00:03:49.860 to a time

00:03:50.520 when all life forms were one

00:03:53.980 and related

00:03:56.120 and that time

00:03:59.880 is a time when

00:04:00.920 the Kualalmachin, the blackfish

00:04:04.340 and the young ones

00:04:07.840 the humans and others

00:04:09.840 all were one

00:04:12.200 the Kualalmachin is considered

00:04:16.740 one of the people that lives under the water

00:04:20.360 that's what the word means, blackfish

00:04:22.780 cosmology, like I said, is a big word

00:04:27.360 so if you can imagine

00:04:30.040 because that's what it takes right

00:04:31.780 black fish

00:04:35.800 but take out the image you have in your mind

00:04:38.160 and imagine that people

00:04:40.100 are actually black fish 0.51

00:04:41.220 as much as black fish are people

00:04:43.660 it's all one family

00:04:45.700 and that's

00:04:48.140 very unusual and it's very unique

00:04:49.920 and the same is true for salmon

00:04:51.860 the salmon woman

00:04:55.040 speaks, spoke

00:04:56.860 to Lummies about their sacred 0.97

00:04:59.560 obligation to the creation. I'm in a very emotional state right now, you have to bear

00:05:13.060 with me. The fact is that you're right. And this is what I've heard the chief of the Lummi,

00:05:22.900 Salik is his name, say this.

00:05:26.440 Talikwa 0.98

00:05:26.960 was showing to the world

00:05:30.420 what the ones that live above the water are doing.

00:05:36.820 Look.

00:05:42.880 Look at my dead baby. 0.88

00:05:46.720 Look.

00:05:50.240 Look at my dying ocean.

00:05:52.900 look for a thousand miles in 17 days 0.57

00:05:58.460 till I put her down

00:05:59.380 and I won't eat

00:06:01.620 all that time

00:06:03.760 the last

00:06:08.080 surviving calf

00:06:09.840 that was born

00:06:13.120 to the J-pods

00:06:15.840 since 2015

00:06:16.700 is missing

00:06:19.880 that calf is called Scarlet

00:06:24.460 J-50

00:06:25.360 and we know

00:06:28.460 from the rake marks on 0.74

00:06:29.880 J-50's side 0.99

00:06:32.560 that she 0.90

00:06:34.640 was midwifed into birth by other

00:06:36.520 members of the pod midwifed

00:06:38.220 pulled 0.87

00:06:40.520 out

00:06:40.920 of her mother by other killer whales to give life 0.77

00:06:44.480 to little Scarlet pulled 0.97

00:06:46.380 out and midwifed 1.00

00:06:47.940 These are the people that live under the water.

00:06:52.840 So yes, the Lumi cosmology goes back to the that time that is.

00:06:59.980 Known as the every when everyone.

00:07:02.640 E V E R Y W H E N and the before time and one time.

00:07:08.740 And that's the time we're speaking in now.

00:07:14.680 The fact is.

00:07:17.940 There are worlds within worlds, and the Sailor Sea is showing us that one world that we are living in is in a deep crisis.

00:07:28.160 And the people that live above the water have to understand they don't own this place.

00:07:35.360 Their presidents don't own it.

00:07:37.720 Their congressmen don't own it.

00:07:40.620 They don't own it.

00:07:43.000 They were gifted it.

00:07:44.300 until that's understood

00:07:47.900 we'll see more dead calves

00:07:51.180 so that's what I have to say to that

00:07:55.680 thank you for your

00:08:00.420 emotional connection

00:08:03.360 it really

00:08:04.040 expresses the grief

00:08:09.220 and the pain around

00:08:10.640 these beautiful being

00:08:13.180 these kin that are speaking to us and i i truly believe that so the lumi reverence for their orca

00:08:22.760 kin brings us to the story of tokatai or lolita an orca who is currently kept at miami sequarium

00:08:31.460 in florida and i'm wondering if you could share with us this story beginning with the traumatic

00:08:37.300 capture of Tokatai back in 1970. We have a website which we talked to you about called

00:08:44.700 sacredsea.org. Sacredsea all runs together.org. And on that website is the work we're doing for

00:08:54.600 the Salish Sea. And part of that work for the Salish Sea is the rescue and repatriation of

00:09:00.040 Tokatai. So on that website is a button called Media Resources. And on that button, Media

00:09:06.720 resources are two videos and one video is a trailer of a film we're doing about the

00:09:15.380 return of Tokatai it's in production and the other is the chief of the Lummi Nation speaking

00:09:21.200 about Kualalmachin. Tokatai if you would see the original footage taken in Penn Cove in 1970

00:09:34.280 it's very hard to even recount

00:09:36.920 but by

00:09:38.860 the captive industry they were herded in

00:09:40.880 by dynamite

00:09:41.640 and underwater

00:09:44.980 explosions

00:09:46.000 they were herded into a

00:09:48.960 cove

00:09:49.460 and they

00:09:53.080 took whale after whale

00:09:55.040 after whale after whale

00:09:57.120 seven

00:09:59.040 whales died they drowned

00:10:00.580 four young ones died they were

00:10:03.040 drowned and each of the drowned whales was their stomachs cut open with cement blocks put in to

00:10:08.240 sink them so they wouldn't be found. These were human beings that did this. If you hear the

00:10:14.840 keening, keening is the sound killer whales make when they are highly distressed.

00:10:21.120 People that were in Penn Cove that day will tell you the haunting sounds of the screams of the

00:10:28.540 killer whales, of the matriarch

00:10:30.860 spy-hopping desperately to search

00:10:32.620 for their family as they were taken

00:10:34.700 onto ships and vanished.

00:10:38.280 The keening

00:10:38.740 is almost

00:10:39.360 too much to bear.

00:10:44.600 Tokatai

00:10:45.020 was taken out of the water that day.

00:10:46.660 She was four years old.

00:10:49.740 And these

00:10:50.660 captains of the universe,

00:10:54.500 of SeaWorld

00:10:55.420 and others, who 1.00

00:10:57.740 irrigate to themselves the right to take these beings captive, shipped her off to Miami. 0.99

00:11:06.500 This is a whale that lives most of its water. Its temperatures average about 50 degrees.

00:11:14.260 She's taken to Miami at four years old.

00:11:19.840 17 other whales were shipped off that day to other sea circuses for people to be treated.

00:11:27.740 Tricks for treats for the whales to educate their kids about killer whales, right? 0.92

00:11:35.580 She was placed in a concrete tank 80 feet long and 20 feet deep for 47 years.

00:11:45.200 She's the only surviving wild orca in North America in captivity.

00:11:50.360 She's the last one. They all died within 15 years.

00:11:53.320 there was a killer whale

00:11:56.420 placed in the Seaquarium

00:11:58.180 Miami Seaquarium's tank

00:11:59.640 and if I sound angry

00:12:00.620 it's simply because I am

00:12:01.940 another killer whale

00:12:04.120 was placed in the tank with her

00:12:05.740 his name was Hugo

00:12:06.640 and Hugo committed suicide

00:12:11.160 he smashed his head up

00:12:16.320 and got the sign of the tank 0.87

00:12:17.140 until he was dead

00:12:17.800 they disposed of his water

00:12:18.840 like waste into a landfill

00:12:20.060 so she was left alone with two young porpoises

00:12:24.820 and she's been there ever since

00:12:26.540 and the Lummi Nation heard about this some years ago

00:12:28.740 but until recently

00:12:30.840 didn't really bring the full weight to bear

00:12:33.560 to get her free and back to her family 0.55

00:12:35.260 her mother is still alive 1.00

00:12:36.460 her mother is now the matriarch 0.95

00:12:39.280 of the L-Pod

00:12:40.840 if you were to go outside

00:12:45.040 Miami's Aquarium

00:12:46.040 stand there in the middle of the night

00:12:48.540 you will hear tokatai singing you will hear her voice

00:12:56.860 she has done that every night for 47 years so we have and joel james my colleague and inspiration

00:13:07.100 is a master carver of totem poles and he carves a totem pole in dedication to the reunion and

00:13:12.940 return and rescue of Tokatai. So that

00:13:15.200 Totempole is now in Gainesville,

00:13:17.560 Florida, at the University of Florida, where it's

00:13:19.360 going to be brought out on December 10th

00:13:21.480 for exhibit, along with an exhibit at

00:13:23.300 the Taylor Sea. It's part of our campaign

00:13:25.600 we're working with to 0.99

00:13:27.240 get her free, get her here, get 1.00

00:13:29.360 her home, get her well, 0.95

00:13:31.340 get her strong, and get her back to her mother.

00:13:34.100 And we will do that,

00:13:35.360 and it'll be done within two years.

00:13:37.880 Miami's Aquarium

00:13:38.740 doesn't take it seriously,

00:13:41.140 but they will soon enough

00:13:43.420 they say she's worth 0.92

00:13:46.540 20 million dollars 0.58

00:13:47.520 we're not going to pay anything 1.00

00:13:50.320 to get her out of there 0.60

00:13:51.140 and the tribe was called

00:13:55.300 to do this by

00:13:56.200 let's put it this way

00:13:57.500 it wasn't a phone call

00:13:58.340 they were told to get this done

00:14:01.160 so we're getting it done 0.95

00:14:03.140 she's with the L-POD 0.95

00:14:04.900 J-K-N-L-POD 1.00

00:14:06.380 make up the southern residents 1.00

00:14:08.260 southern resident

00:14:09.800 killer whale population

00:14:10.960 spend a lot of their lives in lummy waters, traditional waters. 0.96

00:14:17.500 So we have a sanctuary ready for her to return to

00:14:20.860 near Orcas Island and the San Juan Islands

00:14:26.220 where her family tours by routinely.

00:14:29.000 There will be a moment sometime in the next two and a half years

00:14:33.180 when Tokatai is going to be singing out her song

00:14:37.840 and her mother is going to hear it.

00:14:39.480 She can hear it 10 miles away.

00:14:40.960 and they are going to reunite.

00:14:45.200 And that's our job, is to make that moment happen.

00:14:48.180 And the Salish Sea, when that moment occurs,

00:14:51.520 will never look the same again to anybody. 0.89

00:14:56.080 That's the Tokatai campaign.

00:15:02.520 Wow, Kurt, that's so raw,

00:15:05.700 and hearing the details of these captures

00:15:10.000 is devastating but so necessary for us to hear it's just insane to think in 1970 that over 40

00:15:17.820 orca calves were captured and sold eight adults were killed at the time and like you were saying

00:15:23.780 the pods were just completely frantic um yeah so i i just feel compelled to underscore just how

00:15:32.880 traumatic the capture of these orcas was like you were saying to this day human residents of the

00:15:39.000 area recall hearing the frantic keens of matriarch orcas as their children were torn from the sea by

00:15:44.760 helicopters. Similarly, resident orcas avoid Penn Cove, where their relatives were stolen and have

00:15:52.700 done so for the past 50 years. In an article written by J. Julius, who you had mentioned,

00:15:58.600 the chairman of the Lummi Nation, Julius writes, quote, just like Tokatai, members of the Lummi

00:16:04.180 nation have endured centuries of destructive policies. Policies that separated our families,

00:16:10.400 depleted our salmon runs, desecrated our sacred sites, and reduced our traditional fishing areas

00:16:15.500 to a fraction of what they once were. These policies and willful disregard for our treaties

00:16:22.040 have damaged the health of the Salish Sea and negatively impacted the well-being of our people,

00:16:26.760 end quote. I'm curious about the connections between government policy that separated human

00:16:34.600 families, as well as those that have done the same to the Southern residents. How do these stories of

00:16:42.000 separation tell one another? And how does Tokatai's abduction reflect the failure of policy to protect

00:16:48.740 the Sailor Sea? Well, that's an important question. I think it has many different levels

00:16:55.700 that you come in to try to answer

00:16:57.480 I'm not going to pretend to know

00:16:59.300 most of the answers but one thing

00:17:01.300 it speaks to something

00:17:03.540 clearly

00:17:05.520 out of order

00:17:07.280 in the way

00:17:09.020 our

00:17:10.800 society

00:17:12.140 deals with

00:17:14.620 life forms even their own

00:17:16.900 there's something seriously

00:17:19.340 wrong with all of this

00:17:20.540 it's not just normal

00:17:21.840 it's not just normal for

00:17:24.880 a person to come in the community

00:17:28.480 and steal children

00:17:29.320 but what's painfully

00:17:32.540 normal is the ability

00:17:33.760 for people to rationalize

00:17:35.940 doing it

00:17:36.900 everyone that

00:17:39.800 did these things, these government agents

00:17:42.220 or these

00:17:44.520 agents of the

00:17:45.980 sea circuit industry

00:17:47.080 they may be

00:17:50.140 great brothers and mothers

00:17:52.140 but yet they do these

00:17:54.300 things

00:17:54.780 and they can explain it to them

00:17:58.340 so you know I was told once

00:17:59.360 by a woman who

00:18:02.060 counseled battered women

00:18:02.960 and I got to know her fairly well

00:18:05.940 she once told me

00:18:06.780 there's only one thing most important

00:18:10.200 and that is

00:18:14.240 how you explain yourself

00:18:15.800 to yourself

00:18:17.940 everything flows from that

00:18:22.400 I actually met a gentleman

00:18:26.640 who was involved in the captures

00:18:29.420 in Penn Cove when he was 15

00:18:32.660 he was part of the capture team

00:18:35.080 I said how could you do that

00:18:39.920 and he said well I was only 15

00:18:42.640 I said well I was 15 once I wouldn't have done that

00:18:44.740 it's complicated

00:18:47.480 but now he's involved in orca rescue

00:18:50.740 so it came back to haunt him

00:18:55.300 I think I fear

00:18:59.120 and I hope that my fears are wrong

00:19:01.460 that there's something missing

00:19:03.420 in the way we treat

00:19:06.900 life

00:19:08.820 not just orcas

00:19:11.480 but each other

00:19:14.260 there's something missing

00:19:16.840 in the day-to-day cruelty we see

00:19:20.040 In the paper, I had a dear friend who was very involved in Buddhism.

00:19:27.760 She's very well-placed in that tradition.

00:19:32.180 And she went to a seven-month silent retreat, seven months of silence.

00:19:38.520 And he said, what was the hardest thing when you came out?

00:19:45.180 He said, the front page of a newspaper.

00:19:47.040 violence after violence

00:19:50.740 after violence

00:19:51.740 the front page stories of

00:19:54.400 people being less than human

00:19:56.200 to their world and each other and I think

00:19:58.340 killer whales

00:20:00.340 and boarding schools

00:20:02.280 draw a line

00:20:05.820 that we need to pay attention to

00:20:08.240 that we're being

00:20:09.000 we're being

00:20:10.760 how can I put this

00:20:13.360 molded

00:20:14.820 by a system or a process or something

00:20:18.900 to do things unspeakably cruel to each other

00:20:22.820 and to perfectly innocent lifeforms

00:20:25.780 that have done nothing to us

00:20:27.680 but inhabit the same planet.

00:20:32.160 There's something missing.

00:20:34.660 There's a presence of an absence.

00:20:37.760 And that's, I think, what connects

00:20:39.640 what a human being can do to a sentient being.

00:20:44.820 That has the form of a killer whale and how a human being can do that to a six-month-old native child.

00:20:53.040 Carrying it from the arms of its mother and shipping it 2,000 miles away.

00:20:58.680 You know, I, Jewel and I have worked around the world.

00:21:03.700 And one time we found ourselves in Brazil.

00:21:05.560 having an audience with a gentleman

00:21:08.960 who was trying to stop the construction

00:21:10.540 of a nuclear power plant

00:21:13.880 they were going to build on the coast

00:21:14.860 between Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo

00:21:16.440 and we thought, well there's madness

00:21:18.880 so we're having an audience

00:21:22.820 with this gentleman who was fighting it

00:21:24.380 and he was asked

00:21:25.740 are you an optimist?

00:21:31.520 he laughed and he said

00:21:32.640 no, no, no, I'm not

00:21:33.980 I'm hopeful

00:21:35.640 I

00:21:38.460 I have been so distressed by this

00:21:42.680 that I had to go see a therapist

00:21:44.900 and I said to her 1.00

00:21:49.200 J50 0.54

00:21:53.160 and the residents 1.00

00:21:55.200 I can't stop crying

00:21:57.760 I know why

00:22:03.260 she said to me

00:22:07.380 she said to me

00:22:09.920 because you work every day

00:22:14.040 with people with great empathy

00:22:18.780 for their world

00:22:20.880 and it's true

00:22:27.760 empathy

00:22:32.280 is

00:22:33.440 the ability to take on the impressions

00:22:38.800 of the other

00:22:39.440 and I think that

00:22:44.600 when the world saw that

00:22:46.400 grieving mother

00:22:49.340 it took on that mother's

00:22:54.800 song

00:22:56.940 in a kind of mea culpa

00:23:12.040 one can only hope that

00:23:13.680 one can only hope that we find 1.00

00:23:18.460 J50 little Scarlet alive 0.98

00:23:20.120 seems unlikely

00:23:23.760 I was mentioning this to someone here in the tribe about how this morning the residents, very unusual, were all traveling together, and the J-pod was in the lead, tight formation.

00:23:53.760 And the lead of the J-Pod was J-50's mother.

00:24:06.620 It's called the grief formation.

00:24:10.460 the entire resident population

00:24:15.980 standing with the mother

00:24:19.500 who probably just lost her

00:24:22.000 four-year-old baby

00:24:24.020 that wasn't in the formation

00:24:27.960 and nobody knows where it is

00:24:29.320 I need to say this though

00:24:33.220 it didn't have to turn out this way

00:24:35.640 J50 could have been

00:24:42.140 saved 0.96

00:24:44.700 but she died more than likely 0.86

00:24:50.340 she died of starvation

00:24:51.620 her mother was trying to feed her

00:24:53.480 her family shared their food with her

00:24:56.400 isn't that amazing

00:24:57.020 but it wasn't nurturing her because

00:25:00.460 well we don't know why

00:25:02.220 because they're living

00:25:05.480 in a sick ocean

00:25:07.120 we here in the tribe

00:25:11.280 participate in the governor of the state

00:25:13.420 of Washington's southern resident

00:25:15.540 killer whale task force

00:25:17.420 yeah

00:25:19.100 well

00:25:19.600 it's not rocket science what these

00:25:23.420 killer whales need, they need food

00:25:24.940 they need 580,000

00:25:31.140 pounds of Chinook a year

00:25:33.340 survive.

00:25:38.120 They're not getting

00:25:39.080 one-tenth of that.

00:25:43.380 If they really cared about this

00:25:45.000 rather than having task force debate over how

00:25:47.020 many angels can dance

00:25:48.860 on the head of a pin, all they've got to do

00:25:50.940 is take down the Snake River dams.

00:25:52.980 They can do that in two months. They don't even

00:25:55.020 need congressional approval to do it.

00:25:58.620 That's 0.74

00:25:59.100 where the Chinook were decimated.

00:26:01.140 for those dams.

00:26:05.760 But no, instead they're talking about

00:26:08.200 slowing down ferries, you know,

00:26:11.160 or asking tribes to stop fishing

00:26:13.540 in areas that they're entitled to.

00:26:17.920 You know, it's madness.

00:26:22.360 You know, one thing I'll mention to you,

00:26:23.920 the four dams on the Lower Snake River

00:26:26.880 on the Columbia

00:26:27.660 have produced only two hours

00:26:31.820 of electricity that's been needed

00:26:33.520 in the last 10 years.

00:26:36.940 Two hours.

00:26:39.820 Why do we have those dams? 0.89

00:26:45.340 75% of all the schnook 1.00

00:26:46.920 that try to get down that river 1.00

00:26:48.140 are crushed in the dams.

00:26:53.200 You know, it's kind of decision time

00:26:54.920 and I think people that

00:26:59.620 love your show

00:27:00.740 we honor them

00:27:03.220 have to

00:27:09.600 help us understand how we can

00:27:11.640 turn this big ship of a way of life

00:27:14.200 perched

00:27:15.220 on the edge of the Salish Sea

00:27:17.560 that is destroying it

00:27:18.780 because that's what's going on

00:27:25.240 I mean this is

00:27:26.160 they say

00:27:26.680 when industry arrives

00:27:28.680 salmon go away

00:27:29.640 and when salmon goes away

00:27:31.380 killer whales die

00:27:32.520 Chinook

00:27:34.340 is the only food

00:27:35.920 southern residents will eat

00:27:37.660 they don't eat anything else

00:27:39.600 if there's no Chinook

00:27:42.120 you don't have any southern residents 0.99

00:27:45.280 it is

00:27:46.900 a situation

00:27:51.860 we simply have to understand

00:27:54.000 we can win this

00:27:55.480 but not without an awful lot of

00:27:57.720 leaning into the issue and sacrifice

00:27:59.920 I want to talk a little bit more about

00:28:12.080 the

00:28:14.060 issue of the Chinook

00:28:16.280 salmon uh basically the collapse of salmon fisheries in washington oregon california

00:28:24.240 british columbia and now alaska and i've been up in alaska for the last two and a half

00:28:32.440 months and been doing interviews with people around salmon uh basically be on a listening

00:28:39.700 tour and it's really devastating to hear in these last vestiges of intact ecosystems that

00:28:48.260 people have been saying i don't know where the kings are we don't know where the coho they call

00:28:55.340 them the silvers they're not coming back we don't know where they're going they're going out to sea

00:28:59.240 they're not coming back and there's a lot of questions and a lot of confusion and and just

00:29:05.640 really not knowing why they're not coming home the the salmon so i'd like to hear

00:29:13.320 more from you about the chinook specifically and what's happening to the fisheries in washington

00:29:21.440 and in near the sailor sea why do you think although we could state some obvious pointers

00:29:28.000 of why we think they're collapsing i'd like to hear from you your point of view on their collapse

00:29:32.000 and, you know, what is their state in the area

00:29:36.000 and what are the things that people can do

00:29:39.520 to support the return of the fisheries?

00:29:45.140 Yeah, it's been known for three decades or more

00:29:50.580 what the basic problem is in terms of

00:29:52.820 the 98% reduction of salmon runs between 1920 and 1990.

00:30:00.740 98%.

00:30:01.380 and an awful lot of that

00:30:03.760 whether it's whatever part of your

00:30:05.940 talk in the Washington State Pacific Northwest

00:30:07.880 a lot of this habitat loss

00:30:10.100 just

00:30:10.440 they've lost their head they can't even get to where

00:30:13.920 they need to spawn and when they get there

00:30:15.520 the spawning grounds are no longer viable

00:30:17.900 habitat loss

00:30:19.940 is a lot of it not all of it but a lot

00:30:21.940 of it a lot of it

00:30:23.120 and it's one of those things

00:30:25.880 which

00:30:26.140 it is

00:30:29.080 allowing window dressing to pass as a solution for example having buffer zones

00:30:37.020 i love that one buffer zones along a stream and above the buffer zone well you can do anything

00:30:42.880 laugh like i said my degrees in forestry we knew in forestry in 1968 what you had to do to protect

00:30:50.820 salmon the science is not new though they always seem to need more of it but science doesn't make

00:30:56.980 its way into politics and it doesn't

00:30:59.180 make its way into practices on

00:31:01.080 the ground because it is not

00:31:02.380 profitable

00:31:03.960 to do it responsibly.

00:31:07.340 In the Nooksack Bayesian where

00:31:08.940 I am now,

00:31:11.020 it would take a century

00:31:11.980 to get the habitat

00:31:14.780 back.

00:31:18.500 Habitat

00:31:19.060 loss and then you have

00:31:20.280 contamination.

00:31:23.860 I mean, the

00:31:25.080 salish sea especially in the southern portions but really give you an example down in seattle

00:31:31.960 when the uh the beginning of world war ii and the japanese were forcibly removed from their

00:31:39.460 homes and sent to various camps quote unquote there were a lot of strawberry farmers japanese

00:31:45.400 strawberry farmers that had uh truck farms in the seattle area guess who owns their land now

00:31:53.380 Boeing

00:31:54.940 so Boeing

00:31:57.720 moved in and took their land

00:31:58.880 to build whatever

00:32:01.600 they build

00:32:02.160 one of the places that they build military

00:32:05.480 drones

00:32:06.040 some of the most important salmon estuary

00:32:09.760 in southern Puget Sound

00:32:11.000 that they have completely

00:32:12.740 destroyed

00:32:14.540 habitat loss

00:32:18.780 contaminants whether it comes from

00:32:21.400 off the roads

00:32:23.360 through the sewage system

00:32:24.800 out of boats and ships

00:32:26.780 it's just an endless stream of contamination

00:32:29.080 everyone knows 0.86

00:32:30.800 the salmon

00:32:31.700 that the killer whales are eating

00:32:34.820 are contaminated

00:32:37.100 the salmon

00:32:39.360 that the seals are eating are contaminated

00:32:41.400 and

00:32:43.380 why is it contaminated?

00:32:44.740 because we don't have state of the art

00:32:46.600 wastewater treatment systems

00:32:49.020 we don't have them

00:32:50.220 it's aging infrastructure

00:32:53.240 I think overfishing is the least of our worries.

00:33:01.040 Right now, it's simply managing extinction and fighting over the last fish, rather than

00:33:06.640 addressing the problems.

00:33:07.640 The tribes, to their credit, and one of the great ironies of history, I think, is trying

00:33:15.560 to save financial capitalism from itself.

00:33:23.240 And the endless pursuit of profit short term, the unconscionable socialization of cost that goes on and on.

00:33:35.760 These are things that need to be addressed.

00:33:37.520 And I am hopeful that the younger generation has not been so brainwashed by a system that is overtly unfair to everyone but a small percentage.

00:33:48.640 that they are woke to a situation

00:33:51.940 that this is a non-sustainable system.

00:33:56.440 If they want to have...

00:33:59.220 Now, I'll mention something to you.

00:34:00.920 I had dinner in California

00:34:02.160 with some very interesting people.

00:34:05.840 Sitting at my table in Paradise Cove

00:34:07.560 down there near Malibu

00:34:08.660 was a Navajo medicine man and his wife.

00:34:12.600 My host was the director of...

00:34:15.440 It's organized the Foundation of Indigenous Medicine

00:34:17.640 And a young woman who has just started up her fifth startup, high-tech startup, her fifth.

00:34:25.860 She's also an Olympian medalist, mother of two.

00:34:31.720 I mean, you know, one of those people.

00:34:35.020 And she creates virtual reality and security software.

00:34:42.500 Security software for the White House. 0.83

00:34:46.180 and the NSA

00:34:48.020 she said two things I want to mention

00:34:51.140 and she said I can quote her on this

00:34:54.780 said I can teach a nine year old

00:34:58.080 to hack into our electoral system

00:34:59.680 a nine year old 0.84

00:35:00.720 one thing

00:35:03.540 and the second thing she said is

00:35:06.700 I really prefer the virtual world to the real one

00:35:09.100 that terrifies me

00:35:11.020 what really I hope that

00:35:14.480 I'm hopeful that

00:35:17.180 through programs such as yours

00:35:19.400 and people such as you and your listeners

00:35:21.420 that we don't lose the real world to the virtual one

00:35:25.720 because the virtual one is, how do I put this

00:35:27.500 it's not real

00:35:29.140 and as we compromise the real world

00:35:32.580 some people are going to escape into their headsets

00:35:35.020 or their earphones

00:35:36.600 that would be a tragedy

00:35:39.480 and I really appreciate work you do

00:35:42.980 to keep people connected to the real one.

00:35:46.480 The real one.

00:35:48.340 Because that's the one we are actually birthed from.

00:35:52.400 We didn't create it.

00:35:55.860 We were created by it.

00:35:59.020 And as I mentioned in the before time,

00:36:04.940 we were all one.

00:36:06.340 And it wasn't one in a headset.

00:36:07.680 i couldn't agree more with you it's just i see a lot of people turning towards virtual reality and

00:36:18.920 i was uh at a best buy a few months ago and it was really horrifying i hadn't been into one of

00:36:28.440 those stores for a really long time and the first thing i saw was this uh poster of a woman with one

00:36:35.980 of those headsets you know face masks on and I'm like oh my goodness this is where we're going

00:36:42.980 we're gonna look into a screen at a forest and an ocean filled with orcas but if we take that

00:36:49.500 mask off we'll see clear cuts and dead oceans because we are in so many ways being distracted

00:36:55.200 and lost by a world that isn't real it's these you know if you take a picture with a camera you

00:37:02.260 can create a frame that isn't what reality is you can just you know take a take a picture but you

00:37:10.740 know if you actually turn 360 you'd see a very different a very different view and i think

00:37:16.780 this these extinction crises and what happened with taliqua it is these loud cries to wake up

00:37:25.820 and you know thinking that there's only 76 southern residents left and 30 well less than 30

00:37:33.140 have the potential to breed you know some suggest that if immediate action isn't taken the southern

00:37:39.320 resident orcas could become extinct within the next 15 years so waking up is mandatory if we say

00:37:46.880 we care about our kin if we really say that we care and we want to actually live up to that we

00:37:52.500 need to do something and i you know we've been talking a little bit about the snake river dam

00:37:57.880 and the issues of we haven't gone into this but the recreational and commercial vessel traffic

00:38:04.120 the noises that that make underwater how that can psychologically and communicatively affect

00:38:10.540 the whales the pollution you had mentioned the pollution the ongoing threats of future pipelines

00:38:16.420 um salmon atlantic salmon fish farms in bc so of course like there are a lot of stressors

00:38:24.220 but we need to look at these stressors because if we don't look at them with honesty we're never

00:38:29.480 going to be able to do something about it and it's true the population of whales has declined

00:38:34.940 to its lowest levels in 30 years has decreased 20 since the since the late 90s so i i just wanted

00:38:42.920 to bring those things up. And then back to mentioning Chinook, the fact that two thirds

00:38:49.260 of the Southern residents' pregnancies have failed due to starvation. Additionally, the lack of food

00:38:54.520 forces orcas to burn their body fat, which ends up releasing toxins like DDT and flame retardants

00:39:00.900 into their system, further suppressing their reproductive health. So, you know, these are,

00:39:06.980 again, these are things that we really need to look at the starvation. And one thing that I had

00:39:13.120 read while getting ready for this interview is that since 2002, the EIS has designated dam

00:39:19.960 breaching as the best solution to recover wild salmon on the Snake River. And they said that if

00:39:25.000 it was breached, it would double or triple the survival rate of Chinook salmon. So I wanted to

00:39:30.180 bring that up because yeah i i kind of just mentioned a lot of really hard facts uh around

00:39:36.580 the numbers of extinction and starvation and all of the issues that are affecting salmon which then

00:39:43.480 in turn are affecting orcas but then again look if we take out the snake river dam that is something

00:39:49.240 that we can do that would have massive positive consequences so it's not that there aren't

00:39:55.300 solutions, but getting to those solutions, really prioritizing those is where we need to go. And

00:40:01.580 that's, I feel like what you were saying with the economic capitalist technological, gosh, just

00:40:08.680 delusion to be able to get out of that so we can actually do the things that need to be done.

00:40:15.260 It's a curious thing. You have a natural condition. Salmon want to be in the Columbia

00:40:18.920 River and the Snake River. Eastern Washington doesn't want to be 0.92

00:40:22.600 wheat. It's a desert. So they create these

00:40:26.860 dams to sustain an artificial way of life

00:40:30.760 at the expense of a real one.

00:40:35.720 I mean, if you look at the Palouse,

00:40:38.920 the bioregion of the Palouse, it is the most

00:40:42.880 compromised bioregion in North America.

00:40:46.280 So little remains of what it once was.

00:40:48.920 I want to mention one thing, though, about the Chinook back a second to your folks and listening in Canada or even in the northwest are aware that just north of the border here is a very large coal terminal.

00:41:05.540 Called Sawasin, very large, very polluting.

00:41:10.580 Well, you mentioned ship noise.

00:41:12.740 The idea they now have is to create another platform that will service ships, container ships.

00:41:27.360 You ready for this?

00:41:29.420 These ships, imagine a football field.

00:41:33.100 Now walk across four of them.

00:41:35.580 That's how big the ships are.

00:41:36.600 they want to have 0.85

00:41:39.320 three of those

00:41:41.360 going right over primary orca

00:41:43.200 foraging habitat every two days

00:41:44.840 year round

00:41:46.840 and they say

00:41:49.960 this is an example

00:41:51.500 of the

00:41:52.140 disingenuous nature of EIS

00:41:55.780 anything the government

00:41:57.700 does in EIS

00:41:58.340 comments are due by October 5th

00:42:00.740 and then the EIS says

00:42:01.460 this many ships is only a 6%

00:42:05.240 increase in the already existing vessel traffic

00:42:07.520 in any way

00:42:08.160 the southern residents are so highly compromised

00:42:11.200 and won't make much difference

00:42:12.220 that's the mindset

00:42:16.280 of people that are going to make a lot of money

00:42:18.940 off these ships

00:42:19.740 but we

00:42:22.420 you know the people here

00:42:23.980 I think it's really important

00:42:27.260 that they understand

00:42:28.120 it may come a time and may not be far off

00:42:30.800 when they're going to have to put themselves

00:42:33.360 on the line

00:42:34.080 and their fists in the air and their feet on the ground

00:42:38.020 and say, enough, stop.

00:42:44.480 That's what it's going to take.

00:42:46.620 Yeah, I know voting is important.

00:42:48.380 Yeah, right.

00:42:49.640 Yes, but feet on the ground and fists in the air is also important. 0.87

00:42:55.400 There will be no fishing rights for tribes in the Northwest 0.97

00:42:58.140 if men and women hadn't gone to jail, 0.94

00:43:01.520 breaking what was then the law.

00:43:04.080 which is great, a new and better one.

00:43:08.120 And unless people are willing to stand the line,

00:43:11.480 take off their earphones, take off their headsets,

00:43:14.320 and rejoin the world, the real one,

00:43:17.320 we're going to lose it.

00:43:19.060 I taught a class at the University of Washington,

00:43:21.840 forest economics.

00:43:25.220 And, you know, you got a final,

00:43:26.760 everyone gets all bleary-eyed and they're up all night

00:43:28.980 and they come in for the final.

00:43:31.480 And I said, well, you know, already,

00:43:33.940 for your two-hour final.

00:43:37.360 So put all the chairs in a circle.

00:43:41.020 And I said,

00:43:41.800 I want everyone to give me

00:43:43.000 their definition of extinction.

00:43:48.460 That's a big word, you know.

00:43:51.940 You used that word a while ago.

00:43:54.420 And I think sometimes that word,

00:43:56.160 it's like skipping a stone

00:43:57.200 across the human mind.

00:43:58.180 They don't quite pause for a moment

00:44:00.640 and think about that.

00:44:02.080 millions of years

00:44:04.540 dedicated to creation of a life form

00:44:06.520 because of someone wanting to make

00:44:08.760 a short term profit for a small number

00:44:10.880 of people goes

00:44:12.060 extinct

00:44:13.560 I really 1.00

00:44:16.780 believe that tribes

00:44:18.680 probably more than anyone

00:44:20.500 right now

00:44:21.180 are

00:44:23.620 the best chance

00:44:26.620 we have

00:44:27.280 and I really encourage people

00:44:30.200 to stand with tribes when they're standing

00:44:33.000 there for their treaty rights, because treaty rights

00:44:34.860 protect everybody.

00:44:38.420 Everybody.

00:44:40.560 I think

00:44:41.320 personally even more than the Constitution

00:44:42.880 does at this point.

00:44:45.640 At least in this country.

00:44:47.940 So we're hopeful

00:44:49.140 here. We will always be hopeful.

00:44:51.640 And I want to, if I can,

00:44:54.180 before we started

00:44:55.020 this, I wanted

00:44:57.140 to mention this one

00:44:58.160 verse written by Wendell Burry.

00:45:01.320 Do you mind if I read it?

00:45:02.720 Please.

00:45:04.280 Because we have these moments

00:45:05.620 and we look for a place to

00:45:07.280 to

00:45:08.720 resort to our souls

00:45:12.780 and regain our spirits.

00:45:15.600 It's a piece he wrote called

00:45:16.860 The Peace of Wild Things.

00:45:21.160 when despair for the world grows in me

00:45:28.660 and I wake in the night at the least sound

00:45:33.840 in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be

00:45:36.860 I go and lie down where the wood drake rests

00:45:43.020 in his beauty on the water

00:45:44.580 and the great heron feeds

00:45:47.420 I come into the peace of wild things

00:45:53.500 who do not tax their lives

00:45:55.180 with forethought of grief

00:45:56.660 I come into the presence of still water

00:46:01.300 and I feel above me

00:46:05.460 the day blind stars

00:46:07.180 waiting with their light

00:46:08.400 for a time I rest

00:46:13.580 in the grace of the world

00:46:15.120 and am free.

00:46:22.540 So our

00:46:23.400 prayers go to Jay 50 and her mother, her family,

00:46:30.280 the Sailor Sea and all our relations.

00:46:35.620 And to your listeners that they keep their hope up

00:46:38.040 even if their pessimism grows. Stay hopeful because

00:46:42.040 as one person once told me,

00:46:43.520 you're an activist

00:46:46.660 you are not allowed

00:46:50.380 to lose hope

00:47:13.520 Thank you.

00:47:43.520 I think about how she wasn't the only orca ripped from her home, as you had mentioned.

00:47:51.420 In fact, throughout the 1960s and 70s, one-third of the southern residents were taken and sold to parks all over the world.

00:47:59.800 Today, she is the sole survivor of those calves who were taken from the Salish Sea,

00:48:04.880 as orcas who live in captivity often live less than half of their traditional life expectancies.

00:48:09.900 expectancies. So I'm wondering what are the mental, physical, and emotional stresses of

00:48:15.720 living in captivity without the companionship of other orcas? And why do you think she has survived

00:48:22.220 when others have not? And could it be said that she has remained resilient by remembering her

00:48:27.780 home and the songs of her pod? That's certainly true. I've asked that question of people that

00:48:35.680 know a lot more than I do about her and about

00:48:37.780 Blackfish.

00:48:41.400 One

00:48:41.840 answer that has stayed with me is 0.75

00:48:43.340 she's in a tank. She's in an 0.85

00:48:47.600 open-air tank close to the water.

00:48:50.860 She hears

00:48:51.840 the ocean.

00:48:55.660 She may think

00:48:56.900 her family's

00:48:59.640 not far away.

00:49:01.760 That's why she sings every night.

00:49:04.160 I don't know if you saw

00:49:05.220 that part of the video in which

00:49:08.520 Dateline

00:49:11.660 TV show

00:49:13.240 went to Seaquarium with a recording of

00:49:16.560 the L-Pod's songs

00:49:18.720 and they went to the side of the tank

00:49:23.060 and where the Seaquarium

00:49:26.660 minders had stepped away for a while

00:49:28.660 they turned on the tape recorder

00:49:31.580 practically nose to nose

00:49:34.880 with the guy holding the tape recorder

00:49:36.360 over and

00:49:38.780 over again

00:49:40.000 she heard her songs

00:49:42.520 she heard her pause

00:49:44.140 that was 1998

00:49:46.540 I believe

00:49:47.260 she's never stopped singing her song

00:49:49.840 I mentioned that I

00:49:52.840 have worked with a man who was involved in her capture

00:49:56.620 he was also one of her first trainers

00:49:58.360 and he said

00:50:02.300 Tokatai

00:50:02.920 She's an unusual girl. 0.69

00:50:07.700 She's very unusual.

00:50:11.760 She is indeed. 1.00

00:50:13.860 She's also high as a kite. 0.99

00:50:16.200 She's on 14 different kinds of medications.

00:50:19.300 She lives in a chlorinated pool in Miami, in the sun.

00:50:26.220 So she's on a lot of medications.

00:50:29.560 No one really knows her actual state of health.

00:50:33.640 Be that as it may, she displays vigor.

00:50:36.560 You see, when no one's around, she's racing around the pool.

00:50:40.760 She's still happy to be a killer whale, I think, because she really believes she's going home.

00:50:45.560 I was at the aquarium. 1.00

00:50:48.200 We went there with the Lummi Indians.

00:50:53.220 They followed us.

00:50:55.460 They knew who we were before we even got there.

00:50:57.820 was standing

00:51:00.440 by the side of the

00:51:02.200 tank 0.80

00:51:04.780 and a Lummi tribal member

00:51:07.600 councilman and very inspired

00:51:09.700 leader

00:51:10.300 Fred Lane is standing with his

00:51:13.800 arms folded across his chest looking in the

00:51:15.720 water

00:51:16.020 down below 1.00

00:51:17.980 she was all the way in the other side of the

00:51:21.800 pond there the tank 1.00

00:51:23.700 she turns 180 degrees 1.00

00:51:25.940 and swims right over to you 1.00

00:51:27.540 and just hangs in the water

00:51:29.900 so I'm going on there

00:51:34.100 it happened twice

00:51:36.600 two different visits

00:51:38.000 so when that was

00:51:42.120 when it happened the first time

00:51:43.920 and Fred

00:51:45.980 moved aside to recompose

00:51:48.140 his prayers

00:51:48.680 she went back to where she'd come from

00:51:52.240 so I walked

00:51:54.320 around the side of the aquarium and i said uh to the people standing there can i say hi to her

00:52:01.280 and this one gentleman probably in his mid-40s goes no that i can't say hi to her

00:52:09.780 said no but you can say hi to me and i said okay um where's she from and he gave me that that look

00:52:25.080 And he said, you know exactly where she's from.

00:52:30.160 And then asked me to leave.

00:52:34.020 He is the curator of her at the Aquarium.

00:52:39.300 That's her master.

00:52:42.700 I'm sure he has a great family life.

00:52:45.740 He's a wonderful man.

00:52:46.700 I'm not saying he isn't.

00:52:47.720 But I am saying what they are doing with her is beyond evil.

00:52:52.680 she needs to come home

00:52:54.860 and they know it

00:52:55.660 but I also need to say this 1.00

00:52:57.300 the women 1.00

00:52:58.940 that work with her 1.00

00:53:00.580 on a daily basis

00:53:01.620 love her

00:53:02.760 there is no doubt

00:53:04.840 in my mind

00:53:05.520 they love

00:53:07.280 Tokatai

00:53:08.780 management

00:53:10.880 not so much

00:53:12.320 cash cow

00:53:13.540 but they

00:53:15.040 really

00:53:16.440 love that girl

00:53:17.660 you can see it

00:53:19.740 so she does have that connection 0.81

00:53:23.260 but it's also

00:53:24.660 kind of the Stockholm Syndrome 0.99

00:53:26.360 she is a black fish 0.98

00:53:28.760 she needs a family 1.00

00:53:30.380 these women are her family 1.00

00:53:32.280 when she comes back here 1.00

00:53:36.000 we're going to fly her back 0.99

00:53:38.620 that'll express 1.00

00:53:39.720 in one big plane 1.00

00:53:43.180 and she's going to land

00:53:46.740 at Bellingham International Airport

00:53:48.240 she's going to be 0.55

00:53:51.360 taken to the water 0.76

00:53:52.740 slowly taken out

00:53:56.700 to the sanctuary

00:53:58.400 in Orcas Island

00:53:59.400 she's going to have her 1.00

00:54:02.960 handlers, she's going to have 0.99

00:54:03.760 a veterinarian, she's going to have 1.00

00:54:05.160 everyone she needs

00:54:06.280 to reassure her

00:54:07.980 she's okay

00:54:09.080 and then she's going to start

00:54:11.920 going for walks 1.00

00:54:12.860 out into the water and back again

00:54:16.060 out into the water and back again 1.00

00:54:17.620 she's going to learn to feed herself again 1.00

00:54:19.300 and avoid ships

00:54:21.080 and then that day will come 0.95

00:54:23.720 when her mother's going to go by and go

00:54:25.420 I know that voice

00:54:27.840 that is a healing moment

00:54:31.880 for the L-Pod

00:54:34.000 from a trauma that as you said

00:54:37.080 they have never gone back to Penn Cove again

00:54:39.040 they were traumatized

00:54:41.520 just like 1.00

00:54:42.200 native folks taken from family 1.00

00:54:45.520 and put in boarding shoes

00:54:46.320 they were traumatized

00:54:47.260 her coming back to her family

00:54:52.400 will be a healing

00:54:54.260 for that pod

00:54:55.380 and they need it

00:54:58.460 because likely

00:55:00.760 they just lost another one

00:55:02.240 oh Kurt

00:55:06.120 I've just been

00:55:10.480 on mute crying

00:55:12.280 on the other end

00:55:13.520 yeah I do

00:55:17.940 I feel definitely

00:55:19.720 feeling speechless and I would just

00:55:21.500 like to offer

00:55:23.360 to you any way you feel like closing

00:55:25.780 this conversation

00:55:26.660 if you'd like to call out to

00:55:29.460 Taliqua and

00:55:30.940 Scarlett you know however

00:55:33.480 you wish to

00:55:34.520 close this conversation please

00:55:37.540 well that's hard that's a really hard

00:55:41.320 uh

00:55:43.520 You know, I had a dream about her, and though I don't remember all the images in the dream,

00:55:51.100 the felt sense, the felt memory sense of that is what I would send back out, you know,

00:55:59.460 and for what it might mean, is that everything is going to be fine.

00:56:10.440 We're going to be all right.

00:56:13.520 Things will work out because like Scarlett, that fighter, that little fighter, we don't lose hope, Scarlett.

00:56:32.180 We will never lose hope.

00:56:36.560 well i will keep my prayers and energy towards scarlet and i

00:56:45.760 for those who will listen i ask you to do the same and kurt thank you so much for your love

00:56:55.780 and dedication to the sailor sea illumination and our more than human kin the black fish

00:57:05.280 um thank you for spending this time with us today and we'll continue staying abreast of what

00:57:14.000 is to come and take our actions from you all thank you and thank you to all listeners for for

00:57:24.600 listening thank you for listening to for the wild the music in today's episode is by mon pleasure

00:57:34.120 and amoeba.

00:57:36.600 For the Wild is created by

00:57:38.060 Ayanna Young, Erica Ekrem,

00:57:40.640 Julia Jackson,

00:57:42.000 Jackson Kruppf,

00:57:43.340 Jose Alejandro Rivera,

00:57:45.540 and Evan Tenenbaum.

For The Wild - August 23, 2023

KURT RUSSO on the People Under the Sea [ENCORE] ⧸345

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