Southeast

It’s well documented by now that the marine heatwave that hit the Pacific Ocean in 2014 had devastating effects on Alaska’s marine ecosystem and commercial fisheries.

Now, scientists are uncovering long-term impacts on Alaskan killer whales specifically – a harbinger as marine heat waves become more frequent and severe with climate change.

“We’ve learned that females that were growing during those heat wave years grew to smaller sizes,” said John Durban, a senior scientist with the New England Aquarium in Boston who has been studying killer whales in the Gulf of Alaska for two decades.

“If you’re smaller as a whale, it means you don’t have as much fasting endurance, you can’t store as much blubber,” Durban added. “So if you go through lean times, you’re less likely to bring a successful pregnancy to term.”

Durban has been partnering with the Alaska-based nonprofit North Gulf Oceanic Society to monitor several hundred resident, salmon-eating killer whales in the Gulf of Alaska. He flies drones over the water, which capture images of the whales from more than 100 feet in the air.

Those images allow researchers to measure how individual whales are developing over time.

The North Gulf Oceanic Society has been monitoring killer whales in the Gulf for more than four decades. Durban said that work became particularly important in the aftermath of the Exxon Valdez oil spill, which correlated with an “unprecedented” number of whale deaths among two pods that were exposed to the spill, according to NOAA.

The resident killer whales gradually recovered over the years. Or at least they were recovering, before the 2014 heatwave known by many as “The Blob” hit the area, according to Durban’s research.

“We started seeing that this recovery that had happened over the previous three decades basically getting wiped out in the course of a couple of years,” Durban said.

The technology has delivered some good news. This summer, researchers observed three new calves, plus some slightly older ones that appeared to be healthy and growing as expected.

That could mean the population is on a path to recovery. But it doesn’t mean the Gulf’s resident killer whales are in the clear. The females impacted by the heat wave may be less resilient in the face of future events, such as heat waves or dips in the salmon population.

“We’re cautiously optimistic, but I think it does mean that there’s some vulnerable whales out there,” Durban said.

His latest scientific findings haven’t yet been published. But he said he’s working on several scientific papers that lay out evidence that the so-called blob is still impeding Alaskan killer whales’ growth and reproductive success today, a full decade later.

As he sees it, the findings underscore the importance of studying apex predators. They rely on species down the food chain, which means they can serve as early indicators of trouble in the broader ecosystem.

Durban emphasized that the findings also highlight something else: the threat of climate change.

“These marine heat waves that we’re starting to see in increasing duration and intensity around the world are having really important effects on marine food webs.”

The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced this summer it was moving to rescind the Roadless Rule, a 2001 law that protects large swaths of National Forest land from development. 

That includes more than half of the Tongass National Forest, where Juneau is located. On Saturday, more than 100 people gathered in the state capital to protest the move. 

It’s not the first time protections for the Tongass have been in question. The first Trump administration repealed protections for the Tongass National Forest specifically, which were reinstated by the Biden administration.

The USDA’s announcement called the Roadless Rule “burdensome, and outdated.” It said the rule threatens livelihoods and stifles economic growth. 

Alaska’s Congressional delegation unanimously supports the rollback of the Roadless Rule. U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski has said that most of the Tongass would still be protected without it — the parts of the forest that are already designated as wilderness. U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan said rescinding the rule would open the door for economic growth in rural Alaska, and U.S. Rep. Nick Begch said the rule inhibits local management of forests. 

But protesters say Alaskans have more to lose in risks to the land and waterways than what they have to gain through further development. Lingít elders and fishing and tourism industry experts took the mic Saturday to deliver a message: the Roadless Rule should be left alone.

Kaatssaawaa Della Cheney told the crowd her mother had protested clear cutting on Haida Gwaii in Canada in the 1980s. She said when young people stepped up to form a blockade, their parents and grandparents came too. 

“The elders showed up with their regalia and put the young people aside and said, ‘We are going to form the line to keep machines away from our lands, our trees, are ways of life,’” Cheney said. “And that’s what they did.”

Now Cheney said, as an elder herself, she is speaking up in favor of keeping the Roadless Rule. 

Seikoonie Fran Houston is Áak’w Ḵwáan, who originally lived in Juneau. She said development threatens sacred salmon runs and Lingít burial sites.

“This was our territory, and it was taken away from us,” she said. “And now hundreds of hundreds of years later, here I am standing on the grounds of my ancestors fighting to try and protect what they had.” 

Houston said the damage to sacred land isn’t worth the potential financial gain.

And others said the financial math doesn’t actually add up in favor of rescinding the rule. 

Kate Troll has worked in fisheries and climate management in Southeast Alaska for more than 30 years. She says old growth logging, which the rule limits, is a very small piece of Alaska’s economy. And the rule protects resources the tourism and fishing industries rely on, which make up a far greater piece. 

“If doing right by the numbers — right by our economy — was the real objective, we wouldn’t be having this debate,” she said. “If facts really mattered, the Trump administration would realize there’s absolutely no overall economic benefit to be gained by tossing the Roadless Rule out.”

She said the forests serve as irreplaceable carbon sinks, which combat the effects of climate change.  

Xaawk’w Tláa Yolanda Fulmer advocated for the codification of the Roadless Rule, which is being considered by Congress. She said she wants the future of the Tongass to be guaranteed for her grandchildren. 

“So we don’t keep going back and forth with this whiplash politics that keeps happening to us, where one day we’re feeling safer and we’re feeling protected,” she said. “And the next it’s being ripped from us, just like our trees are being threatened.” 

Fulmer referenced a comment Rep. Begich made last month, saying that he’s heard Southeast Alaskans asking for the timber industry to be revived.

“You’re not listening to the people I’ve been talking to from Kichx̱áan all the way to Yaakwdáat that says, ‘Stay out of our lands. Leave our trees alone. Find another way,’” she said, using the traditional names for Ketchikan and Yakutat. 

The public can comment on the proposed rescission of the Roadless Rule through Friday, Sept. 19 at federalregister.gov. 

Biologists have launched the first-ever state study of brown bear numbers on Sitka’s Baranof Island. Managers say they need updated data to manage the population appropriately.

Baranof Island is really big — about 1,600 square miles and larger than the state of Rhode Island. The brown bear population is currently managed using really old numbers based on populations from a different island, measured nearly 40 years ago.

Stephanie Sell, a wildlife research biologist with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, said there’s never been a population estimate study completed on Baranof.

“The management numbers that we’re using for brown bears on Baranof were extrapolated from a project that happened on northern Admiralty (Island) in the late 1980s and the early 1990s,” Sell said.

There was a track study in the 1930s, where researchers went up salmon streams to measure the widths of paw pads to determine how many animals were on the island, but modern research techniques invalidate it.

Based on the information they found on nearby Admiralty Island — located between Sitka and Juneau — Sell said researchers determined there was likely more suitable habitat on Baranof, meaning more bears.

The number they settled on? 1,045.

But Sell said they really don’t know how accurate that number is. And to be able to sustainably manage brown bears on the island, it’s really important to have updated information.

“What we’re trying to do is figure out what those numbers are,” she said.

Sell estimates the study will take about five to six years to complete. Biologists recently wrapped a similar six-year project near Haines and Skagway. Sell said ADF&G had been managing for a population of 400 bears in the area, but the study led them to lower that estimate to just over 300.

“I don’t know if it’s going to be more or less on Baranof Island, but that’s what this project is going to hopefully find out,” she said.

The price tag on the study is still unknown, according to Sell, but they have a funding source: the Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration Act, which is supported by federal excise taxes on the sale of ammunition and firearms.

In early September, Sell and her assistant began capturing brown bears near Sitka and putting GPS collars on them to learn more about their habitats and day-to-day movements.

“We use helicopters wherever we can to dart bears, and then it takes us about an hour to process the bears,” she said. “We also use foot snares in places where we won’t run into people, for safety reasons. And then the other method is free range darting, where we sit next to some sort of salmon stream or some sort of attractant, where the bear is drawn in by some natural food source, and we just wait for bears to show up.”

Each of the 25 bears they aim to capture each year will wear a collar for up to two years. When they retrieve them, researchers will then be able to look at that data and focus their efforts on the next part of the study: genetics.

“Once we get more spatial data and see where bears are moving across the island, we can start looking at where we’re going to actually put genetic sampling detectors,” Sell said. “We’re going to start catching bear hair to increase our sample size, and that way we can use that information to determine how many animals are actually on the island.”

Sell said Baranof bears are generally really dark, almost resembling black bears. They’re also quite fat this time of year because of the island’s healthy salmon runs — something she said they didn’t see everywhere else this year.

“What we do know about Game Management Unit Four bears is that they’re genetically similar to polar bears,” Sell said. “They had refugia, it seems like, since the last ice age. And so they’re genetically different from mainland bears.”

(Refugia are geographical areas where a population, species or community has survived environmental instabilities over long periods of time.)

As of Friday, Sell said biologists have put 20 collars on bears: 14 on females and six on males.

Brown bear hunting season in Sitka starts on Sept. 15. Hunters are currently able to harvest 42 bears on Baranof — that’s 4% of the estimated population. Sell said they hope to be done tagging for the season before that begins.

Later on in the study, she said they’ll be reaching out to the community to see if anyone wants to volunteer by checking hair snares. If anyone has questions, wants to volunteer, or even give her a guesstimate on how many bears they think might be on Baranof Island, Sell said they can email her.

Last year, the Klondike Road Relay got off to a late start when a tour bus crash delayed the race, forcing participants to skip the first few legs. This year, the event celebrated its biggest gathering, despite broken infrastructure and ongoing political tension.

Half party, half grueling mountain run, the 109-mile race stretches from downtown Skagway up the Klondike Highway, all the way to Whitehorse, Yukon. It retraces the steps of the gold miners, except these participants wear wild costumes, flashing safety lights and followed by support vehicles. One of those vehicles this year was an open trailer outfitted with a working hot tub.

Julia Frost from Juneau almost missed this year’s event. It was her first time running the relay. A mechanical issue on the Alaska Marine Highway System made the long journey even more challenging.

“The LeConte broke down so our three cars that we had booked could not come,” Frost said. “So we scrambled yesterday and found one rental car and one Turo for an obscene amount of money. But we were coming, we were doing this.”

So, how much did that broken down ferry cost Frost’s team?

“The Turo was $1,300 and the rental was like $1,200 — a lot,” Frost said. “I mean, we’re sharing it with 10 people, whatever. You know, it’s the whole experience.”

Angene Johnson from Anchorage didn’t so much want the Klondike Road Relay experience as much as her husband didn’t want to run two of the ten legs. The couple flew to Juneau and made it to Skagway before the ferry mishap. But Johnson worried about how they’d get home to their two children if the vessel wasn’t restored.

“We have not had any official communication yet, but we’re trying to start making some backup plans, just in case it’s not functional,” she said. “We have a number of potential worst case scenarios.”

Johnson’s teammate, Aaron Cravez, was less concerned.

“We got plenty of beer, so we’re good,” he said.

For Yukoner Kirsten Madsen, the race was about restoring a relationship.

“I definitely had some qualms,” she said. “As we were driving, I said this is the first time I’ve crossed the border since Trump’s election. And there have been other things that we didn’t do so far this summer because of that. But this race and the kind of friendly feelings we have about Skagway made it an exception for me.”

Madsen was part of team Tiger Fire.

“We’ve got some tiger ears and a bow tie and a tail that’s affixed in a weird, not quite accurate location, but it’ll work,” she said.

Race coordinator Ryan Sikkes says this is the biggest race ever at 2,000 entries sold. One team had to cancel because of the broken ferry.

On an uncharacteristically sunny day, Sitkans spread out all across town, kayaking out on the ocean and scaling mountains for a rare, clear view. However, one specific group of Sitkans is tasked with an important quest: rescuing a blacksmith’s daughter from a horde of goblins.

Armed with their gifted set of dice and assigned character sheets, the seven players wield their pencils to take notes on their surroundings. Gathered around a table at the Sitka Public Library’s multipurpose room, the players range in experience from this being the first time they have played the tabletop role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons, or D&D, to veterans with years of experience and D&D podcast recommendations under their belt.

Riley Whitson is what the game deems the Dungeon Master, a storyteller who guides the players throughout the whole gameplay experience, from helping them create their characters to narrating their characters’ surroundings. Having regularly mentored middle schoolers in how to play D&D under the city’s Parks and Recreation Division, Whitson was recruited to lead a two-week workshop for adults. Having played the game for over two decades, what keeps Whitson coming back for more is D&D’s unique collaborative nature.

“Dungeons and Dragons is kind of a shared story,” Whitson said. “You’re all characters in some type of adventure going on or some activity, and everyone gets a piece to kind of make it a living, breathing story. And that’s what excites me the most.”

After defeating the goblins and freeing both the blacksmith’s daughter and a captured paladin (played by an experienced player who joined that day), the party uncovers a statue of a knight with a mysterious riddle engraved below it:

“If you are to keep this, you must first give it to me…”

As a fantasy-game that prominently features riddles, D&D is a game that is fully dependent on the imagination of its players. As a born-and-raised Sitkan, Whitson believes that Sitka is a prime location for fueling prospective players’ imaginations.

“All I ever wanted to do as a child was leave this place,” Whitson said. “We’re very rural and isolated, and so your imagination kind of tends to take you on adventures no matter what, whether you’re imagining just going to Seattle for a weekend, or you’re off in a mythical land where it’s always sunny, you can just put yourself in a world that you want to go to.”

First-time player Carole Knuth was inspired to attend the library’s workshop by her grandson’s imagination, and wanted to learn how to play D&D in order to create an opportunity to connect with him. However, learning how to harness her imagination while learning the plethora of unique game mechanics has been a challenge.

“I’m more of a black-and-white person and to have this much — well, the numbers and the the variety and imagination was just really stretching for me,” Knuth said.

While it can be an adjustment, Whitson believes that the limitless imagination D&D encourages in its players is what makes the game so special.

“All of us played pretend when we were kids, and everybody has some part of them that still wants to,” Whitson said. “And so once you see people kind of get over that initial shock of, oh, there’s numbers and probability and math and stepping outside of your own shoes, you see people just take to it.”

It is moments of learning and camaraderie that the players experienced in their session that led Adult Services Librarian Margot O’Connell to co-create this event with Sitka Parks and Recreation. She believes hosting tabletop role-playing game events are an important way to facilitate community building.

“We kind of think of ourselves as a community living room,” O’Connell said. “And I think with games like Dungeons and Dragons or board games, they are inherently very social. And so anytime we can provide a space for folks to come and build community together, learn new skills, just come and hang out, I am thrilled.”

This fall, Whitson will lead some intermediate D&D workshops, as well as some middle school and high school campaigns with Sitka Parks and Recreation.

A gold exploration project at Coeur Alaska’s Kensington Mine north of Juneau has revealed thousands more ounces of precious metals. The high-grade gold deposits will extend the mine’s life through 2029. 

Steve Ball, the general manager at Kensington, said the company spent a few years and nearly $90 million drilling to discover more gold. Now those efforts have paid off. 

“We increased our reserves from a low point of 261,000 ounces at the end of year 2022, to 501,000 ounces at the end of year 2024.” 

Ball said those new reserves, which they’ve already started excavating, represent around five years of mine life.

Brian Holst is the executive director of the Juneau Economic Development Council. In an email, he said this is promising for workers here, since the mining industry is one of the community’s largest private employers.

“Both Kensington and Greens Creek Mine provide some of Juneau’s highest paying jobs, averaging over $120,000 a year, so knowing that Kensington Mine has a longer future of work in Juneau ahead of them is great news for the workers and our community,” he said. 

Kensington employs around 380 people and roughly 40% of them live in Southeast. The mine is also Juneau’s second largest taxpayer after Hecla Greens Creek Mine. 

Kensington mine is located about 45 miles northwest of Juneau in the Berners Bay Mining District. It’s owned by Coeur, a multinational company based in Chicago, Illinois, which began operating it in 2010.

The mine has raised environmental concerns. Last year, it reported a tailings spill. Separately, it was potentially responsible for a fish die-off downstream. In 2019, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency fined Coeur more than $500,000 for multiple environmental violations. 

The price of gold is on the rise. As of today, it’s at roughly $3,600 per ounce. 

Deantha Skibinski is the executive director of the Alaska Miners Association. She said the positive trend makes Alaska a more attractive place to drill, given how expensive it is to establish gold mines here. 

“That certainly incentivizes companies to do that exploration in Alaska to hopefully bring more mines online,” she said. “So it really is a positive driver in terms of growing our industry here.”

Ball said that Kensington staff have already started more exploratory drilling with the hopes of extending the mine’s life even further.