“when they are gone from nature, we will have already worked to preserve them,” says jóhanna erla, the director of marketing at the perlan museum. a year ago, the perlan opened its ice caves exhibit – even integrating snow and ash from nearby volcanoes into that first-ever indoor glacier replica. but soon, ice caves like the perlan’s may be all that’s left for visitors. in 2003, iceland held a funeral for okjökull, the country’s first glacier to vanish from climate change. researchers estimate that by 2200 almost all of them will be gone. 

historically a geological menace for icelandic settlers, these icy goliaths have recently become a growing major attraction in the country’s robust tourism economy, along with providing the backbone of its energy infrastructure. but iceland’s population is over 4 times smaller than the number of international visitors, and the tourism boom comes at a carbon cost: despite iceland’s comparatively low greenhouse gas emissions, which advance global warming, visitors to iceland contribute to a surprisingly high proportion of iceland’s carbon emissions. with so much on the line, an uncertain future leaves the tourism industry scrambling to decide how best to share the experience of their glaciers before they’re gone.

iceland’s glaciers grew over thousands of years as layers of snow compressed under their own weight to form hulking, crystalline expanses of ice, streaked with remnants of volcanic ash. encompassing 11% of the country’s land, glaciers once posed a danger to early icelandic settlers as they melted seasonally, flooding valleys and creating torrential rivers that restricted travel. now, they captivate more than an estimated million visitors a year with their signature, ethereal blue glow. such nature-seeking tourists provide 39% of the country’s gdp and support almost half of its jobs. and in a country that boasts almost 100% renewable energy, more than 70% of it comes from hydropower that relies on water from glacier melt.

“the future is pretty scary, safe to say,” says andri gunnarsson, the chairman of the icelandic glaciology society and manager of hydrological and glaciological research at landsvirkjun, the national power company of iceland. “[iceland’s glaciers] will disappear. there’s no more uncertainty; it’s just about the timing.” as their glaciers vanish, iceland’s energy landscape, tourism attractions, and economy will have to adapt.

along with facilitating seasonal field work, gunnarsson leads guests and scientific researchers on seasonal glacier expeditions in iceland. from huts maintained by the glaciological society, researchers can get up close to glaciers to track their melt while in dialogue with people outside academia, like artists. for gunnarsson, engaging different parts of society with the reality of the climate crisis is an important step toward educating the public.

“we know the data but scientists aren’t always the best people to tell a story,” he says, while acknowledging the complexity of having visitors travel from abroad for his expeditions. “you want people to witness climate change, but at the same time it’s fueling the climate crisis.”

this irony is not lost on the country’s officials. “you can’t really compare anything called tourism in my youth with what it is today. it’s just changed so dramatically,” says Ólöf Ýrr atladóttir, former director general of icelandic tourism. in her 10 years as director, atladóttir often puzzled over how to solve the tourist industry’s crowd-management issues. during her tenure, she says she contemplated a disneyland-like approach to managing crowded natural tourist attractions. many popular sites, such as hot-steam geysers, glaciers, and volcanos, are dangerous for visitors in such large numbers, she says. by curating the experience more, she believes visitors would get a safer and more sustainable experience.

“people travel because they want to have an expression of freedom, and we have to maintain that,” atladóttir said. “but if i was a glacier, how would i look at what is happening?” according to the iceland monitor, more than 80% of tourists rent cars during their stay and arrive by plane or ship, which are high emission methods of travel.

now running and operating her own travel agency, atladóttir says losing glaciers would be complicated for the economy and come with difficult consequences for the country. but in the face of inevitable change, atladóttir advocates for future planning that considers potential new attractions that melting glaciers might reveal, such as river rafting. “conservation sometimes is looking at nature as a static thing, but glaciers have always grown, receded and changed,” she says. “you have to think, are you preserving [nature] just because you happen to be there and you like the way it is?”

at the perlan museum, the world’s first attempt at preserving the experience of a glacier proved tricky. to test such a large ice structure, the museum used a decommissioned fishery warehouse freezer, mimicking the layer-by-layer compression of snow that forms real glacier ice. although the museum opened six years ago, due to logistics and covid-19 related challenges, the ice caves exhibition has only recently celebrated one uninterrupted year of operation. the completed exhibit is held inside one of the six water tanks that the museum is built on, and features real snow from the nearby bláfjöll mountains, and volcanic ash sourced from eyjafjallajökull, a volcano that last erupted in 2010. 

today, visitors can descend into a blue-ice series of tunnels under the perlan for a completely instagrammable glacier experience. along with touchable recreations of glacier moss and frigid temperatures, visitors can pose at the selfie station or on the “game of thrones”-inspired ice-throne before ascending out of the exhibit into a climate change exhibition on glacier melt.

“of course it’s going to be different, because you aren’t actually going there. because not everyone can,” says erla, the director of marketing at the perlan. “it’s about learning, getting a sense of the deep cold and experiencing the inside of the cave.” even while real glaciers exist, she says visitors come to ice cave for its accessibility. due to the danger of visiting real glacial ice caves, such as unpredictable weather and rough terrain, erla says going to an ice cave may not be safe for all tourists. located near travel ports in reykjavík and running on renewable energy, the ice caves exhibit also provides a glacier experience at a relatively low carbon cost.

while some glacier hiking tour companies may be utilizing a “see them before they’re gone” strategy in their marketing, erla says the perlan is only in the business of education. like gunnarsson, she views the experience of a glacier as an important part of understanding their significance. “i don’t think climate change is a selling point. i think it’s just reality,” she says, noting that artificial ice caves could eventually replace lost glaciers as a tourist attraction. at the perlan, visitors can also experience other recreations of nature, such as a virtual northern lights show or learn about the great auk, a now-extinct icelandic bird.

glaciers were historically “just a part of the landscape,” but as awareness of climate impacts has increased among the population, erla, gunnarsson, and atladóttir all say that they have become an important icelandic symbol. “just look at our flag,” erla says. “it represents ice, fire, and water. it’s part of the country.” 

for atladóttir, thorough future planning by icelandic officials is a critical, and historically overlooked, key to developing sustainable tourism that can recover after glaciers melt. but with planning, she believes the country can be resilient to a glacier-less future. “it is sad,” she says. “but it is a reality. and you adapt to that and then you find beauty in something else.”

editor’s note: lindblad expeditions, our planet forward storyfest competition partner, made this series possible by providing winners with an experiential learning opportunity aboard one of their ships. all editorial content is created independently. we thank lindblad expeditions for their continued support of our project.

eleven years ago, unity college, a small environmental college tucked into the woods of rural maine, became the first institute of higher education in the country to divest, scrubbing their finances clean from fossil fuels. with the help of climate activist bill mckibben and activist groups, unity college’s story started a movement. today, over 100 schools are divested or in the process of divesting from fossil fuels. from private, wealthy goliaths such as harvard and yale to the entire california public college system, fossil fuels are out the door. 

on this planet forward audio story, i talk to the former president of unity college about how divestment works and the story of how his school became the first to do it. also, he happens to be my dad.

after a century of hard-fought controversy over invasive varieties such as toxic and flammable eucalyptus trees, shoreline-enveloping ice plants, and the unstoppable pampas grass dominating everything else, it seems residents of america’s most biodiverse state have had enough. but for indigenous cultures, this latest trend in gardening is old news. 

native societies have lived in california for thousands of years, gathering and propagating native plants for food, medicine, crafting material, and cultural practices. as the environmentally destructive side of western agricultural practices becomes increasingly impossible to ignore, even state legislators have turned to traditional ecological knowledge for best sustainability practices in environmental planning.

“native peoples are able to now tell their own stories,” says nicholas hummingbird, whose popular classes on indigenous knowledge are offered through his native plant-focused instagram. “not be seen as victims of a genocidal past, but show what we have always been capable of.” 

in lecture halls, in the greenhouse, and on zoom, the students of hummingbird and other indigenous teachers not only learn how to care for native plants, but how to build a reciprocal relationship with nature.

diego cordero: a native plants nursery for the tribe, by the tribe

before the curtain fully closes on the california summer, heatwaves turn the valley of santa ynez into a frying pan, toasting the landscape and residents with temperatures over 105 degrees fahrenheit. several times a week, diego cordero turns his back on the santa barbara ocean breeze and makes an hour-long commute to the santa ynez band of chumash indians reservation to check on the native plant nursery where he works.

“i can’t miss a day of watering with brutal heat like that,” says cordero, “i’ll lose a bunch of plants.” cordero is the lead environmental technician for syceo, the santa ynez chumash environmental office, where he works with a small team to monitor, manage, adapt, and restore the natural ecosystem on the reservation. 

while many native plant nurseries exist across california, cordero says the nursery on the santa ynez reservation is “a little bit different.” instead of focusing on plants with ornamental value, aka pretty enough to put in your lawn, he often works in collaboration with the tribe’s cultural office, focusing on plants that the tribe would historically use in every-day life. plants are provided to members of the tribe on a suggested donation basis.

“even if the plants aren’t endangered, they’re hard for people to get to,” says cordero, who says that many of the most sought-after native plants are native to wetland habitats, which are often now the sites of california’s major cities. according to the california water quality monitoring council, 90% of california’s wetlands are now lost. other popular plants are grown in grassland habitats, where according to the 2016 textbook, “ecosystems of california,” 90% of the native plants have been replaced by non-native or invasive varieties. 

as climate change continues to alter the natural landscape on the reservation, members of the tribe can look to the nursery on the santa ynez reservation for a healthy, well-managed stock of their most culturally significant plants. medicinal plants, such as the cold-remedying yerba mansa, are available for those with experience using medicinal plants. juncus, also known as black rush, can be dried and woven by basketweavers. blue dick, which cordero describes as a slow-to-propagate, but “pretty little plant,” grows a garlic-like bulb, known as a corm, which is delicious when roasted and served as a historically significant source of starch.

to keep the wealth of knowledge of native plants flowing to the next generation, the santa ynez chumash environmental office runs several educational programs throughout the year. for the homework club, a youth education program in collaboration with the tribal learning center, cordero and other team members teach kids about the native plants and ecosystem on the reservation through scavenger hunts, art projects, and hands-on workshops. the environmental office coordinates with the culture department for activities at camp kalawashaq, a children’s environmental summer program, and hosts chumash earth day celebrations, and reservation clean-up events. 

cordero sees the resiliency of the tribe mirrored in his favorite class of plants, native grasses. he says the secret to these plants’ survival is in the depth of their roots, which can go up to 12 feet deep to seek out any traces of moisture in the soil, allowing them to survive long periods of drought. 

“it’s literally a deep-rooted existence,” cordero says. despite hardships, “eventually the rains do come.”
 

gerald clarke jr.: an artist living between two calendars

the fruit of the prickly pear ripens in spring, peppering the desert landscape of southern california with its magenta flesh. in the summer, the plump green pods of the honey mesquite tree are ready for picking. in the fall, rich, starchy california black oak acorns tumble from their canopy. 

gerald clarke jr., a member of the cahuilla band of mission indians and two-time elected tribal official, has fond memories of gathering edible plants throughout the year with his two daughters and making traditional dishes. “it’s really a plant calendar,” he says, explaining that the cahuilla tribe would follow the annual growing cycles of edible plants across the diverse landscape of southern california, gathering plants intentionally to ensure a plentiful supply year after year. 

but as a professor of ethnic studies at uc riverside, clarke says he follows the plant calendar in addition to an academic one. this balancing act is one he has long practiced: before teaching indigenous culture and history, he shared his sculptural and conceptual art practice with college students as head of the art department at northeast texas community college and assistant professor at east central university. 

clarke’s art focuses on indigenous themes, blending multimedia methods of weaving, sculpture, and painting. but due to the scarcity of native plants in natural environments, clarke says he doesn’t employ traditionally-used native plants in his art. “if i’m going to go out and gather plants, i want it to be for something vital to my subsistence, you know?” he says. “i don’t want to use the forest to make art. i don’t like to cross those boundaries.”

into his classes at uc riverside and art studio alike, he carries the weight of indigenous history. “native plants and native history are inherently interlinked. the organized genocide of the environment and our people are one and the same,” says clarke. his students not only learn a comprehensive curriculum on tek, a popular shorthand for traditional knowledge, but the importance of applying this knowledge correctly. clarke and other scholars say well-intentioned policies often ignore the diversity of california’s ecosystems: what works in one environment could harm another. 

“fire is a great example i always share with my students,” clarke says. studies have shown that before colonial settlement in the 1800s, indigenous tribes regularly practiced cultural burning as a method of forest management, contributing to an estimated 4.5 million acres of california that would naturally burn each year. but after colonization, a zero-tolerance fire suppression policy took over, leaving the forest underbrush to become the kindling fueling the deadly megafires of recent decades. 

only since the spring of 2022 has state legislation begun to clear the way for prescribed burns to manage this crisis, but historical cultural burning practices are not necessarily the same thing. indigenous activists say that seasonal timing, methodology, and post-fire management derived from tek are more effective at restoring biodiversity and ecological health. 

clarke’s students are angry, and he loves it. “they’re like, ‘why didn’t we know that?’ there’s a hunger for the truth, not the romanticized history we’ve been taught since kindergarten,” he says. in the classroom, he strives to uplift his students to action. 

“if i just focused on the things that we’ve lost, i think that’s a depression we’d never recover from. instead, i focus on the miracle that we’re even still here,” he says. 

nicholas hummingbird: activism in the garden and on zoom

in a zoom class in early december, a powerpoint slide shows a young boy gently smiling at the just-gathered acorns cupped in his palms. his father and instructor of the class, nicholas hummingbird, named him tuhui, which means a drop of rain in the samala language, historically spoken by indigenous tribes in southern california. 

“it only takes a drop of rain to germinate a seed, for a seed to seek out more water,” hummingbird says. “but the promise of that seed is a new beginning, a new future.” 

in his popular online classes on native plants, hummingbird’s students can pay on an affordable sliding scale to take two-hour online classes on a broad range of topics, spanning from the minutiae of tending to native plants in your own backyard, to indigenous uses for california native plants. through his instagram @california_native_plants and @_native_hummingbird, hummingbird sells and ships seeds to students who live in the state and occasionally offers in-person cooking classes with the native plants that he gathers with his son.

“my job as an educator is to take what i’ve learned, and make it accessible to anybody and everybody so that we are on equal footing,” says hummingbird, whose lessons are not only drawn from his lived experience as an indigenous person but also his background in native plant management in both national park service and private native plant nurseries. while building hahamongna native plant nursery in pasadena, california, hummingbird grew his reputation as a teacher and horticulturist, leading a team of volunteers to sustainably and responsibly propagate native plants with habitat restoration in mind.

even with these successes, hummingbird found these experiences bittersweet, opening his eyes to the widespread mismanagement of native plants. in his classes, hummingbird pulls no punches: his students not only learn how to grow seeds, but how to spot ignorance and manipulation. “money is the incentive, not a better environment,” he says. “people with good intentions can cause catastrophes when they’re not given context or the right information.”

to offer his students a deeper understanding of his culturally-driven techniques for responsible plant propagation, hummingbird’s lessons weave the complex relationship between the historical genocide of indigenous people, habitat loss, and climate change. “when you have a concept of the past, you know what has been lost,” he says, referencing the widespread biodiversity loss in california due to single-crop agricultural practices, or landscaping with invasive plants that decimate native plant populations. “do we double down on the arrogance of settler colonialism and try to make failed practices work?”

while there is some knowledge he won’t share out of respect for his community, he hopes his work informing the greater non-native public can contribute to a “better, more livable” future.

“at the end of the day, i’ll take what i’ve learned, and give it to the next generation,” says hummingbird. he compares teaching to walking down a path together, with no experts and only mutual learning. “even if my footsteps only go so far, yours can then continue on that journey.”

this past september, in slack-calm waters, captain steven melz and his deckhand performed an experiment. fathom by fathom, five different styles of crab traps dropped beneath the surf, delivering lunch to dungeness crabs waiting on the ocean floor. despite a century of unchanged crab trapping techniques, melz hopes to find alternative gear that can sustain the future of the beleaguered bay area dungeness crab fishery, and solve its biggest — and perhaps surprising — problem: whales.

whales are a big problem for crab fishers, or depending on who you’re asking, crab fishing is a big problem for whales, which can become entangled in the ropes attached to crab fishing traps. 

after whale entanglements in the ropes attached to crab fishing gear spiked, a 2017 lawsuit resulted in new whale-safe restrictions on california crab fisheries. although crab fishing season historically opens in november, for the last several years, lingering whale populations in the area have delayed the start of the season until after the valuable holiday market. experts and fishers predict these truncated seasons will become the new normal.

“i would love it to be the way that it was,” said melz, a commercial crab fisher who began crab fishing on his late father’s boat over 30 years ago. “but that’s not going to happen.”

in dedicated working groups, state regulators, game wardens, ecologists, and fishers collaborate to innovate viable whale-safe gear. as numerous other strategies to make conventional gear safer have been implemented, finding a mutually-agreeable alternative crab fishing gear has become a central sticking point. with their livelihoods at stake, some fishers have taken innovation into their own hands.

a tangled history
 

“crab pots,” the conventional gear for trapping crabs, hold bait inside four-sided closed woven cages. crabs enter through tunnels in the netting, while escape rings allow for smaller crabs that don’t meet regulated size requirements to exit. crab pots rest on the ocean floor and are attached to floating buoys that mark their location through a vertical line of rope, which whales can become entangled in.

depending on their permit, fishers set out hundreds of pots a day, which often remain in the water for multiple days. but the longer that ropes remain in the water, the higher the chance of entanglement with a whale, which can result in injuries or death. the whales, snagging their fins and bus-sized bodies on the ropes, can drag gear for thousands of miles, embedding the ropes into their flesh and creating challenges around identifying the origin of the fishing gear.

entanglements happen as whales migrate down to their winter breeding grounds in mexico, and pass through the bay area’s dungeness crab fishing zones. as climate change warms ocean waters, this migratory timing has shifted, overlapping with crab fishing season along the west coast.

prior to 2013, the national oceanic and atmospheric association (noaa) reports an average of 10 whales per year confirmed to be entangled in fishing gear along the u.s. west coast.

but in 2015, a warm water event known to ecologists as “the blob” resulted in a drastic increase of whales in the bay area during crab season. the number of entanglements almost doubled from the previous year. by the end of the season, 50 whales, primarily humpbacks, had been recorded to be entangled along the west coast. 

in 2017, the center for biological diversity, an environmental activism nonprofit organization, sued the california department of fish and wildlife (cdfw), stating that these entanglements were violations of the endangered species act, which protects humpback and blue whales. 

“it’s really clear that lawsuits by private citizens and environmental groups are absolutely crucial to making sure that laws work,” said patrick sullivan, media director for the center for biological diversity. “we just see it as part of the democratic process.”

in response to the lawsuit, fishers in both the recreational and commercial sector say they feel disproportionately targeted as the “low-hanging fruit” compared to other industries, such as cargo ships that collide with whales. data shows that these are a leading cause of whale deaths and have a high fatality rate. but on the west coast, these events are difficult to document as many whales sink before they are found; experts say as few as one in 10 whale strikes are recorded. 

after negotiations and an intervention by the pacific coast federation of fishermen’s associations, which represented crab fisherfolk, the lawsuit reached a settlement, and cdfw developed programs to regulate crab fisheries, based on a yearly risk-to-whales assessment.

“they want a program where they can shorten seasons, pull gear in, reduce the number of [ropes in the water],” said ryan bartling, a senior environmental scientist on the whale safe fisheries project. as part of the settlement, the dungeness crab fishing gear working group was formed to brainstorm whale-safe gear alternatives with input from all stakeholders.

1,000 cuts: the impact of regulations

“[the crab fishery] is a shell of its former self because of the regulations,” said captain larry collins, who is president of the san francisco fisherman’s association and member of the dungeness crab fishing gear working group. “we call it death by 1,000 cuts.”

as part of risk assessments formulated by the group, noaa scientists now conduct an aerial survey of whale populations before the start of each crab fishing season. if too many whales are detected, the season remains closed until the next survey. if entanglements are detected, the season closes early.

fishers face many challenges from both the delayed season starts and early closures. for several years, crab fishers have missed the lucrative thanksgiving market for crab, which is a traditional holiday food in the bay area. fishers also say that starting as late as january means more dangerous weather, competition from northern fleets and large wholesale companies, and that the unpredictable timing adds high costs to retain crews.

“we call it death by 1,000 cuts.”

“i like whales,” said collins. “but now whales are costing me $50,000 to $70,000 a year.”

whale populations are increasing and have continued to remain in high numbers through the start of dungeness crab fishing season in november. “the season is not going to look like it once was, just based on the data we’re seeing,” said bartling. “there’s still going to be a crab fishery, it’s just going to look a little bit different.”

pop-up gear: can technology provide a solution?

as part of the working groups, stakeholders modify existing gear to be more whale-safe, and review proposals for alternative gear that could allow fishing during season closures with lowered whale entanglement risk.

one of these proposals is a new gear technology in development, known as pop-up gear or by the misnomer, “ropeless” gear. pop-up gear reduces the amount of time ropes spend in the water by storing the buoy and rope on the ocean floor with the crab pot, rather than connecting the crab pot to a buoy on the surface through a suspended vertical rope. when triggered by a remote control or a preset timer, the popup gear releases the buoy and rope, which float to the surface to be retrieved by a fisher.

 

fishers remain unconvinced that pop-up gear is viable, citing the difficulties in operating as a fleet around unseen gear, unfeasible costs, and high rates of failure during tests.

without a surface buoy design marking its location, fishers are concerned with overlapping as each boat lays hundreds of crab traps in the same zone, which can lead to tangling, lower catches, and gear failure.

“they think we lose gear now?” said collins, who participates in a lost-gear retrieval program. “you gotta be able to see the buoys [on the surface of the water] so you don’t tangle with everybody and their brother.” 

at over $1,000 a pot, pop-up gear could be over three times more expensive than conventional crab fishing gear. if the buoy fails to pop-up, the gear becomes irretrievable; lost pop-up gear may pose a larger risk to whales and boat engines, as fishers unwittingly lay gear on top of the unseen ropes below, and ropes from multiple sets of gear tangle with each other.

“it’s a huge capital investment,” said captain shane wehr, a commercial dungeness crab fisher with family roots in the san francisco fishing community. “it would probably weed out half of the fishermen, and guys would sell out of the industry completely.”

regulators and scientists see potential in pop-up gear. “i love the idea of ropeless gear,” said dr. elliott l. hazen, a research ecologist at noaa in monterey, california, who sees pop-up gear as a promising technology that requires further testing. “how do you help fishermen avoid each others’ gear? if you can solve that problem, along with the sheer cost of ropeless gear, i think it’s an amazing solution. i really do.”

although a $500,000 grant currently exists for pop-up gear testing, bartling says few fishers have signed up to participate in gear trials. fishers say they are wary of regulations that would force them to reinvest in the expensive pop-up gear if the trials are successful. 

“it’s a fear from decades and decades of having their way of life stripped away,” said captain brand little, a commercial fisherman. “if something gets taken away, its never coming back”

hoops, scoops and loopholes

captain brand “hoop net” little, received his nickname for his advocacy of another, less experimental type of alternative crab fishing gear as a solution to whale entanglements. 

traditionally used in spiny lobster fishing, hoop nets are shaped like volcanoes, with a circular opening at the top of a wider, circular base. unlike crab pots, hoop nets have no other openings. because of their open top which allows for crabs to escape once they have finished eating the bait, hoop nets cannot be left out for longer than two hours.

due to this incentive to check hoop nets every two hours, the window for entanglement is much smaller. as two hours is too brief to leave the hoops unattended, any entangled whale would be quickly found, allowing time for the whale to be reported and potentially helped.

hoop nets were first seized upon by the recreational crab fishery, which is also impacted by whale risk-assessment closures, but has separate regulations. shortly after the delayed season started in november 2021, captain james smith, a former commercial crab fisher turned recreational charter boat captain, noticed that the text of the recreational regulations allowed for hoop net use during the closure.

“everybody was trying to get their hands on hoops as fast as they could,” said smith. despite initial doubts from his peers on the efficacy of hoop nets, smith was able to tweak his hoop net process to consistently make his catch limit of 10 crabs per net, per day. once the word got out, charter boat businesses were able to salvage their crab fishing season by using hoop nets.

on the commercial side, little, a participant in the dungeness crab fishing gear working group, then noticed that recreational fishers began fishing for crab with hoop nets, despite the whale-risk-related closures. “and we’re all just sitting here waiting,” said little. “why can’t i try these?” 

but while they recognize the success of hoop nets for the recreational fisheries, some commercial fishers say hoop nets are a non-option for commercial fleets. “the guys that run my boats say, ‘f*ck hoops. f*ck ‘em from here and back,” said wehr. 

compared to crab pots, hoop nets catch less crab and require more work. due to the two hour window for operating each hoop net, fishers are concerned of the potential of retrieving gear during storms, which can form quickly on the water. although the costs and set-up of hoop nets and crab pots are similar, many fishers feel reinvesting in new gear is too costly in both price and labor.

“all i can do is go out, use my boat, and try to come up with my ideas,” said melz, who participated in pop-up gear trials, and decided to test hoop nets against crab pots for himself. he tested five variations of gear; three versions of a hoop net, and two versions of a crab pot. 

the winner? a crab pot without a top, like a hoop net, but with the other design features of crab pots that add efficiency.

“i lovingly call them scoops,” said melz, nicknaming the modified crab pot. with an open top, his scoops require the same short use-times that make hoop nets safer for whales. but unlike hoop nets, scoops are modified crab pots and would require fishers to simply modify their existing inventory.
 

 

the process for securing hoop net or scoop use commercially would require little and melz to go through the lengthy process of applying for an experimental fishing permit, which would give a limited number of fishers an opportunity to fish with experimental gear.

little said industry competition, alongside the fear of traditional crab pots being banned if hoop nets are successful enough, could put a “huge target” on his back.

“there’s $10 bills on the bottom of the ocean. there’s millions of them and it’s a race to pick them up the fastest,” said little.  “and now you’re sending 50 guys out there to get a head start? it’s not going to be popular.”

some fishers say it’s time to revisit a reduced-gear solution they initially rejected and test the efficacy of the other numerous whale-safe improvements they’ve made to their conventional gear by setting only a portion of their gear out in the water. but due to the initial pushback, regulators are no longer considering this option.

moving forward, together

crab fishing season was slated to open this past weekend. but with over 100 whales detected off the coast, commercial fishermen have been benched for a fourth year in a row; only recreational fishermen using hoop nets were permitted to begin their season.

“we’re stewards of the resource,” said captain richard powers, president of the golden gate fishermen’s association, which represents northern california charter boat fleets. “we’re doing everything in our power to be sustainable. we want this to remain exactly what it’s been: part of our heritage.”

even though a solution won’t come in time for this year’s season, the commercial fleet, charter boat captains, regulators, and scientists say they are committed to collaboration and share the same goals.

“we’re working to solve this, not just because it’s the right thing to do, but because we want a viable fishery,” said commissioner eric sklar of the california department of fish and game commission. he said that the stakes are clear: if whale entanglements continue to remain unsolved, it may mean the end of the dungeness crab fisheries.

“there is not one fisherman who wants [entanglements] to happen,” said captain dick ogg, a commercial fisher who assisted during noaa sponsored disentanglement first responder courses, and participated during the aerial surveys of whale populations during entanglement risk assessments. “this is where we make our living. why would we do something detrimental to the environment?”

after the working groups and regulations fulfill the conditions of the settlement, the california department of fish and wildlife says the fishery could file for an incidental take permit, which grants an industry with a permitted amount of yearly “take”. take is defined as an unintentional, but expected, disruption or harm to a species of animal protected by the endangered species act.

while incidental take permits have been called a “necessary evil,” many are in agreement that this would represent a last-ditch solution.

“fishermen are the ones who are gonna want to protect [whales],” said melz, who took the level 1 disentanglement responder training. “because if they fail, we’ll fail.”