The small, briny shellfish are native to the region and a traditional food. They are an important part of the marine ecosystem as they are filter feeders and contribute to the intertidal habitat for crab, juvenile salmon, birds and other marine wildlife.

However, Olympia oyster populations have diminished from overharvest, development and industry impacts on tidelands.

In the late 2000s, the tribe learned that the Puget Sound Restoration Fund (PSRF) had a map of sites where Olympia oysters used to grow, including in Sequim Bay. The tribe partnered with PSRF and CCMRC to start an Olympia oyster restoration project in the bay in 2012, a partnership that continues to this day.

“There were very few Olys on the beach in the beginning,” said Chris Burns, a Jamestown S’Klallam natural resources technician and representative for the tribe on CCMRC. “It took me two tides to find the 80 oysters that were needed for genetic analysis prior to broodstock collection.”

 Efforts by the partners to enhance the habitat and introduce oyster seed on the south end of bay have included setting out seeded and unseeded oyster shells, and collecting broodstock. In 2019, the tribe received a grant through the Natural Resources Conservation Service to expand upon the CCMRC-supported restoration sites with 100 cubic yards of blank shell and 100 bags of hatchery-produced seeded cultch.

 “We learned early on that the main limiting factor was the lack of settling substrate for juvenile oysters, so we brought in a bunch of blank oyster shell onto the beach,” Burns said.

 The partners also found that trying to cover large areas with shell did not work, because they just sunk in the mud, becoming unavailable for juvenile oysters to settle on.

Through surveys, the partners started to dial in what kind of habitat Olympias preferred—wet, seepy substrate with a bit of freshwater influence, Burns said.

The latest efforts have involved placing shell in small piles that hold water longer between tide cycles as the little oysters like to be wet during low tides, he said.

 In 2024, the tribe and CCMRC spread 160 cubic yards (75 tons) of blank Pacific oyster shell on the tidelands where Olympia oyster seed could settle. The partners also spread seeded oyster shell in areas considered premium oyster habitat, said Annie Raymond, the tribe’s shellfish biologist. 

As restoration has expanded across the bay over the years, so have the surveys with new ground to cover.

“Measuring oyster density gives us a population estimate, and size gives us age demographics, so we can tell if there has been any recent recruitment,” Raymond said. “Finding areas of good habitat and recruitment is the goal, as we want to see recruitment every year. These surveys tell us how restoration is working.”

“This collaborative effort emphasizes not only the restoration of oyster habitats but has fostered a holistic approach to restoring Washington’s only native oyster,” said Rebecca Mahan, habitat manager for Clallam County Department of Community Development.

An Olympia oyster measured on the tidelands of Sequim Bay. Story and photos: Tiffany Royal

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“Is I-5 providing some sort of barrier between the Olympic and Cascade herds like it does for cougars?” said Kim Sager-Fradkin, the tribe’s wildlife program manager. “Are animals not exchanging genetics?”

The tribe is collecting 1,000 elk genetic samples—tissue, hair or blood—for a broadscale analysis from herds on the Olympic Peninsula and in the Cascade Mountains. 

The tribe is getting samples from multiple sources, including other tribes’ wildlife departments and hunters, Olympic National Park, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, and a select group of state hunters. The preferred sample is tissue, such as a snippet from an ear. They also obtain samples by way of the Olympic Cougar Project from the remains of elk killed by cougars.

Samples are sent to a lab in British Columbia for genetic analysis, after which scientists from Panthera, a partner in the Olympic Cougar Project, will do a statistical analysis of the lab results.

“We’re basically trying to create a map that shows the genetic differentiation and helps us determine if we need to improve connectivity between regions,” Sager-Fradkin said. 

This includes supporting state efforts to increase wildlife connectivity planning with highway overpasses.

If the project shows inbreeding or low genetic diversity, then it will be important to protect wildlife habitat corridors and make sure elk are able to move around, she said.

The Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe has gathered samples of elk DNA from a variety of sources, including Olympic National Park. Tiffany Royal 

An elk caught on a wildlife camera on the Olympic Peninsula. Photo: Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe. Story: Tiffany Royal

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After sounding the alarm for decades about the need to manage outsized populations of pinnipeds, the treaty tribes are encouraged by a bipartisan bill to amend the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA), and are grateful for the collaborative effort from co-sponsors Reps. Baumgartner (R-WA05) and Randall (D-WA06) to support salmon recovery.

Called the Northwest Endangered Salmon Predation Prevention Act, the law would allow the lethal removal of pinnipeds to protect salmon listed under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) and other threatened species in Washington and the Columbia River watershed.

The pinnipeds of concern are harbor seals and California and Steller sea lions, predators that have driven Pacific Northwest salmon to functional extinction because the 1972 MMPA has no provisions for managing these top predators when the ecosystem is out of balance.

The harbor seal population is at carrying capacity—the maximum size the environment can support without degrading resources—and both of the invasive sea lion populations continue to increase. Tribal fishers have watched growing numbers of seals and sea lions travel into river mouths and upriver, interfering with our harvest and feeding on the declining number of salmon.

State legislators directed the independent Washington State Academy of Sciences to synthesize what we know about pinniped predation, where the knowledge gaps are, where additional research is needed, and assess the scientific and technical aspects of potential management actions.

Published in 2022, “Pinniped Predation on Salmonids in the Washington Portions of the Salish Sea and Outer Coast” concluded: “Taken together, the preponderance of evidence supports the hypothesis that current populations of pinnipeds are a contributing factor in the decline and depression of salmon populations in Washington State waters. … Strategic and appropriately scaled adaptive management of pinniped populations are key to resolving these uncertainties but likely will require lethal removals.”

Salmon are a treaty-protected resource. Without them, tribes can’t meaningfully exercise our right to harvest fish. They also are a keystone species of this ecosystem, with some providing nutrients to the rivers where they die after spawning, while others feed critically endangered southern resident orcas.

As implemented, the MMPA prohibits any action that could effectively abate pinniped predation, which has hindered the protection, conservation and recovery of ESA-protected salmon.

The proposed legislation closes a policy gap between the MMPA and ESA. Allowing pinniped predators to drive down the populations of threatened salmon is inconsistent with the expressed intention of federal laws. We can’t protect both marine mammals and endangered species when marine mammals are the threat to the endangered species.

We have tried nonlethal measures such as acoustic deterrents and hazing to address the overpopulation of these predators, but the effects were temporary. Studies have found that seals and sea lions learned that the food reward was worth the irritation of acoustic deterrents and continued preying on salmon anyway.

This legislation is the first step toward adaptive management, allowing intentional lethal removal of pinnipeds to be carried out by eligible entities, including federally recognized tribes with treaty-reserved fishing rights in western Washington.

The federal government has a trust responsibility to protect tribal treaty rights, which requires active adaptive management of threats such as pinniped predation.

We need to take action now, because allowing pinniped predation to continue unregulated is an existential threat to already depressed salmon stocks. We are looking at a future without salmon, which would have cascading impacts disrupting ecosystem function, resiliency and the food supply.

The only way to restore balance to the ecosystem is to move forward with legislation that allows fisheries managers to control the populations of the marine mammals that are taking more salmon than many stocks can endure.

Above: A seal eats a salmon caught in Puget Sound. Photo by Louise Johns for Smithsonian Magazine.

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If water temperature isn’t cool enough during their life span, the stability of an entire population can be impacted, said Leah Mellinger, Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe’s finfish program manager.

To better understand this, the tribe is testing the water temperature tolerance of juvenile chum salmon. 

“The tribes and Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife are developing a comprehensive chum salmon management plan and one of the big missing chunks is how freshwater degradation impacts smolt productivity and pre-spawn mortality,” Mellinger said.

Climate change also is a motivator for starting the study.

“With changing hydrology and climate, rivers are expected to get warmer,” she said. “It is necessary to understand salmon temperature tolerance to be able forecast run sizes and manage populations.”

The tribe developed a thermal study to test around 2,000 chum from about 20 populations in western Washington.

Within each population, 100 juvenile chum are pulled from a hatchery before their scheduled release or beach seined from a nearby creek during outmigration, to assess both natural and hatchery fish. The fish are dispersed into 32-ounce mason jars placed in 12-gallon tubs filled with local creek or hatchery water. 

A heating element slowly increases the water temperature and a pump circulates the water so the temperature increases at a steady rate. Dissolved oxygen is pumped into each jar so that temperature is the only stressor on the fish during the test. 

Staff check the temperature every 10 minutes and observe the fish. When a fish flips, indicating it would not recover in the wild, the temperature is noted and the fish is pulled from the jar and placed in a recovery bucket before being released back into the hatchery or stream.

“We just make them a little unhappy for a few minutes and in return, get important information,” Mellinger said. “While there are many factors that play into fish survival, this kind of information is so necessary that you really can’t do anything else without the baseline.” 

The fish start the experiment at their local water temperature to minimize stress. Some populations seem to handle more heat than others, Mellinger said, as some flipped at 25° C (77° F) while others tolerated as warm as 28° C (82.4° F).

“If we know the rivers are getting to a certain temperature, we could expect that the production of those fish, either on the escapement side or on the smolt side, is probably going to be a lot lower, and that can feed into forecasting for chum four years ahead,” she said.

Following the juvenile study, the tribe will conduct a similar study on a smaller group of adult chum to see if results correlate. 

“If so, then we can extrapolate that out to endangered populations instead of assessing every adult population and potentially adversely impacting ESA-listed stocks,” Mellinger said. 

Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe finfish program manager Leah Mellinger tests the water temperature in jars containing juvenile chum salmon for the tribe’s water temperature study. Story and photos: Tiffany Royal

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Muckleshoot Indian Tribe staff and fishers caught 85 northern pike during a four-week fishery in May and June during an ongoing project to net the big lake to reduce populations of non-native predatory fish. 

While the tribe and Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) staff have sporadically encountered the ravenous predator since a first detection in 2017, the number found this year marks a worrisome increase. Last year, they saw only three. 

 A booming northern pike population will mean fewer salmon in the lake—and fewer chances to catch salmon, kokanee, trout and other fish for tribal and non-tribal fishers alike, said Jason Schaffler, the fisheries division director for the tribe.

“We don’t want them here. They’ll limit everyone’s opportunities in the future,” he said. 

The pike were likely illegally transported and released into the lake. Pike are classified as a prohibited aquatic invasive species (AIS) under Washington state law.

Northern pike are large, growing up to 45 pounds, with spiky teeth. They are voracious eaters, mostly focused on soft-bodied fish but also willing to eat frogs and ducklings. They can reproduce quickly and severely damage ecosystems, and pose a particularly dire threat to juvenile sockeye salmon, which feed and grow in Lake Washington for up to two years before swimming into the ocean.

“They’ll eat anything they can fit in their mouths,” said Tiffany Armstrong, a biologist with the tribe. “They sit and wait for something to go by. If it’ll fit in their mouth, they’ll go after it. They eat a pretty hefty amount of salmon.”. 

The tribe is exploring next steps including practicing invasive vegetation control — which would remove vegetation that serves as pike’s hunting grounds and nursing habitat — in an effort to limit the invasive fish’s reproductive output, and will delve into one question: Is the current northern pike population reproducing in the lake? If so, it may prove more difficult to control.

Coordinated response with tribe and state co-managers and expanded federal, tribal, state, and local funding partnerships will be essential to contain impacts and prevent long-term ecological and economic consequences.

In recent years WDFW also operated a state-funded project to suppress populations of non-native predatory fish that feed on salmon in Lake Washington. Despite requests from WDFW, co-manager tribes, and fishing and conservation organizations, this $1.4 million budget proviso was not funded by the State Legislature in the 2025-2027 biennium.

For now, tribal staff hope fishers know that northern pike are illegal to transplant in the lake, and should be killed immediately if caught. Pike may not be transported while alive anywhere in Washington.

If possible, fishers should also take a photo and report the northern pike by phone (1-888.WDFW-AIS) or email (ais@dfw.wa.gov) to the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) or through the online form at: invasivespecies.wa.gov/report-a-sighting.

Top: Northern pike caught in Lake Washington by the Muckleshoot Indian Tribe on May 6. Photos provided by the Muckleshoot Indian Tribe.

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In 2017, the U.S. Navy was building a pier on the Coast Guard base in the bay to accommodate large vessels that escort naval submarines through the Strait of Juan de Fuca.

“It was a pretty large pier and was going to have some environmental impact,” said Matt Beirne, the tribe’s natural resources director. 

Mitigation projects were developed, including salvaging marine plants from the pier construction site. Eelgrass meadows, designated as critical habitat in the state of Washington, buffer the effects of ocean acidification, stabilize the nearshore, and are used by salmon, other fish, invertebrate species, marine mammals and birds for foraging, spawning and rearing.

Divers from the tribe and PNNL harvested about 7,500 plants from the site in 2017, including eelgrass. Half were planted on another shoreline in the bay, and the other half were placed in outdoor tanks at PNNL’s facility to grow before being planted.

To everyone’s surprise, the number of eelgrass plants at PNNL doubled the first year. By 2019, the number had tripled, Beirne said. 

Since then, the tribe, PNNL and volunteers have planted 6,000-9,000 eelgrass plants in the bay every two years. This spring was the final effort in which 17,205 individual eelgrass shoots were planted, bringing the project to 43,205 plants moved. 

“The fact that we would harvest half the tank for our periodic plantings and two years later have the same number or more meant we could provide much more benefit that we initially thought,” said John Vavrinec, a senior research scientist at PNNL.

“It has been a truly exciting and rewarding project for our staff and a great collaboration with PNNL,” Beirne said. 

The plantings also have benefited from the tribe’s numerous shoreline restoration projects in the bay, he said. 

Over the years, the tribe has removed structures from the Ediz Hook shoreline, such as creosote, concrete and riprap, then restored the beaches with a gravel and sand mix. Some projects involved the use of sand that had accumulated on the Elwha River following dam removal. 

“It has created this great positive synergy with the subtidal recolonization of eelgrass,” Beirne said. “A lot of that sand has been transported from the beach down into the shallow subtidal areas by long-shore drift processes, and that’s created this really nice habitat for natural recolonization.”

Eelgrass shoots are tied with jute twine onto rebar, which is then placed in the subtidal areas of Port Angeles Harbor so the eelgrass can create habitat for juvenile salmon and other marine life. Story and photos by Tiffany Royal

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Tribal members started the day on the Tacoma waterfront by honoring the first salmon of the season, then gathered in Fife to mark the opening of the tribe’s new longhouse, the first on their lands since the last one burned down more than 170 years ago.

The new longhouse includes about 17,300 square feet of indoor space, including a great room with amphitheater seating plus a dining room and kitchen. The tribe put it to use immediately with a first foods ceremony held during the longhouse opening.

“For me, it represents the spiritual foundation by which our community can begin to heal,” said Puyallup Tribal Councilwoman Annette Bryan. “We’re bringing back our songs, our dances, our ceremonies. To have this structure where we can do these ceremonies next to the river on our homelands of our ancestors is special.”

The opening included a ceremony naming the longhouse x̌ʷiqʷadiʔalʔtxʷ, or Thunderbird House.

“Our home is coming home,” said Connie McCloud, a tribal elder and heritage division manager. “This will be a place of healing, of gathering, of feeding each other.”

The longhouse will connect tribal members to their heritage, their ancestors and the treaty rights that so many fought for, Bryan said.

“This space will help us exercise our treaty rights,” she said.

Bryan said she is grateful to all the people and organizations that helped make the longhouse a reality, including the tribal council, Puyallup Tribal Enterprises, the tribe’s heritage division, and Tahoma Construction.

The longhouse ceremony was preceded by the First Fish Ceremony, where tribal fishers catch the first fish of the season, then return it ceremonially to the water.

“I feel blessed in my heart to be able to do what we do,” said tribal councilman Fred Dillon. “We’ve been doing this since time immemorial.”

Puyallup Tribe of Indians Vice Chair Sylvia Miller holds the ribbon steady while tribal elder Connie McCloud, also heritage division manager for the tribe, wields golden scissors during the grand opening of the tribe’s new longhouse, which coincided with the annual First Fish Ceremony. Photos and story: Trevor Pyle

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North Sound tribal members joined groups of Bellingham fourth graders this spring as they visited a local beach to study salmon in the wild through the Whatcom Marine Resources Committee’s Beach Seines with Schools program.

Before students practiced identifying juvenile salmon by species during a program field trip in May, Jim and Sandra Bura shared stories about the natural and cultural histories of the fish.

“Remember when you see the fish here, they came from the Nooksack River,” said Sandra Bura, of Lummi Nation, at Boulevard Park on Bellingham Bay. “And someday they’ll come back, a long way, to the river again.”

Her husband Jim Bura, Nooksack Indian Tribe member and fisheries harvest manager, shared that while small salmon are migrating outward into Bellingham Bay in the spring, some large salmon are migrating back inward, through the bay to the river.

“We’ve had fishermen these past few weeks harvesting these fish for our community,” he said. “We catch them, smoke them, can them. These fish, our people have survived on forever.”

Sandra Bura reminded students of the five species of salmon. She described how the color of their bodies, shapes of their tails and patterns like dark spots on their sides can help distinguish one type of salmon from the other.

Lummi stock assessment staff then used a seine net to gather a sampling of juvenile salmon and other marine life from along the beach. Students observed coho and chum salmon, as well as an abundance of shiner perch, a few shore crabs and a sculpin.

The students practiced taking field notes, including the species and size of each fish and the occasional drawing of their observations.

Beach Seines with Schools is a program of the Whatcom Marine Resources Committee in partnership with the Lummi and Nooksack tribes, Northwest Straits Foundation and Salish Sea School. A series of field trips takes place in April and May with participating schools and tribal guest speakers from throughout Whatcom County.

Above: Fourth graders gather around while a juvenile salmon is placed in an observation aquarium so they can measure the fish, identify the species and draw their observations during a Beach Seines with Schools field trip. Photos and story by Kimberly Cauvel

Seining program connects students with salmon, tribes

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“Our goal is specifically to re-evaluate the peak molting period of Dungeness crab in management region in eastern Strait of Juan de Fuca,” said Devynn Gately, the tribe’s crustacean biologist. The management region includes Sequim Bay, Discovery Bay and near Port Angeles.

Understanding the timing of the molting period is vital for protecting the resource, Gately said. 

During molting, crab shed their hard shell, becoming extremely soft and vulnerable to predators and handling mortality. In addition, female Dungeness crab mate right after molting, so closing the fishery during peak molting ensures a sustainable population.

“We’re trying to avoid harvesting during this time frame to protect the resource and benefit our fishers,” Gately said. 

The tribal fishery typically is closed April 1-June 21, but tribal fishers have advised scientists that soft-shelled crab are still being found after the closure period, during the harvest season.

“So what does this mean?” Gately said. “Is it a change in the season of the molting period due to shifts in environmental conditions? Is it location based, dependent on habitat? Is it time to reconsider the timing of the harvest window and closure period?”

Prior to the study, Gately held a workshop with Jamestown’s crab fishers to get an idea of where to sample and other logistics they come across when harvesting. 

“Getting that input from the fishermen helped tremendously,” she said. 

Since last November, the tribe has been sampling crab once a month by placing 36 pots throughout 12 sites. They note each crab’s sex, carapace width and shell condition before returning it to the water.

Sensors attached to a crab pot at each site record water temperature and dissolved oxygen data, tracking whether those environmental factors could be associated with shell condition.

This work is supported through Washington Sea Grant’s Pacific Northwest Crab Research Group, a collective of tribal and state co-managers and other researchers.

“The idea is to streamline everything,” Gately said. “If we’re all doing crab survey work and collecting similar data, then we can share the data and have it be applicable across crab management regions.”

A Dungeness crab being documented by size and sex for a study about peak molting periods in Puget Sound. Story and photos by Tiffany Royal

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“These efforts are making a difference,” said Jason Griffith, environmental program manager for the Stillaguamish Tribe of Indians.

Through two major project phases, the tribe has restored about 320 acres of delta at the zis a ba project site, which adjoins with another about 150 acres restored by The Nature Conservancy.

The recently completed phase 2 of the project incorporated a network of distributaries and smaller tidal channels. These pathways enable freshwater from the Stillaguamish River to disperse more broadly across Port Susan Bay, making portions of the bay cooler and less saline. The channels also give fish navigating through the estuary more pathways to follow.

The tribe is gathering insights about the function of the renewed habitat while planning another major phase of restoration.

Each phase involves setting back dikes or levees to invite water onto a landscape previously converted for agriculture. Reopening the delta to the tides restores critical habitat for the depressed run of Stillaguamish River chinook and other salmon populations.

“This restoration work is designed to provide future generations with access to healthier and more abundant salmon populations,” said Kadi Bizyayeva, vice chair of the Stillaguamish tribal council and fisheries director for the tribe.

Success so far has been evident, with salmon found in freshly inundated marsh and newly carved channels soon after work was complete. Chinook, coho, pink and chum salmon have since been recorded during monitoring, along with trout, common nearshore fish species, and invertebrates important in the marine food chain.

Monitoring occurs biweekly February through July. The goals include better understanding what the capacity is for fish where habitat is restored and learning which populations of salmon are benefiting from the new acreage.

Despite pouring rain one day in May, a team of fish biologists and research scientists navigated a boat into the evolving estuary to conduct this monitoring.

The Skagit River System Cooperative (SRSC), a natural resources management agency that supports the Swinomish and Sauk-Suiattle tribes, leads the monitoring in coordination with the Stillaguamish Tribe.

“We can make predictions about how many fish this could benefit, but we have to get our feet wet to be sure,” said Correigh Greene, senior research scientist at SRSC.

The team moves from channel to channel, hopping onto muddy shorelines, casting a seine and gathering data at each of 14 monitoring sites. Along the way, they note the species and size of each salmon they find. They also scan them for hatchery tags.

If no tag is detected, the team collects a fin clipping for genetic analysis to help determine population origins. When a hatchery tag is detected, the team sometimes keeps the head of the fish to retrieve the tag and determine which hatchery program the fish came from.

Salmon have been intercepted from the Skagit, Snohomish and Stillaguamish river systems, showing the regional value of estuary habitat—an important nursery where juvenile salmon can grow and improve their odds of survival before they swim out to sea—to overall Puget Sound salmon populations.

Above: The monitoring team pulls a seine on shore at one of 14 monitoring locations around the zis a ba project site. Photos and story by Kimberly Cauvel

Restoration effort is decolonizing the Stillaguamish delta

Stillaguamish estuary restoration gives juvenile salmon more places to rear

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