With the thickest pelts of any mammal, sea otters were highly coveted by fur traders. Russian ships, followed by Europeans, arrived on the west coast of Canada in the 18th century and began selling furs to overseas markets for high fashion, with China being the most popular destination. At the peak of the fur trade in the 1800s, four luxurious, silver-tipped sea otter pelts could fetch enough money to buy a house in Victoria. But as quickly as the market boomed, it went kaput. The global population of sea otters crashed from upwards of 300,000 to just 2,000 by the early 20th century. Along B.C.’s coast, they were wiped out entirely, the last one shot in 1929.

As explosive as their demise was, so too was their reappearance. The sea otters transplanted to Vancouver Island quickly re-established themselves, growing in number and spreading around the island and across to B.C.’s mainland. To the north, however, the similarly affected archipelago of Haida Gwaii — once home to a thriving sea otter population, estimated between 5,000 and 10,000 — was left waiting.

Made up of some 150 islands off the coast of northern B.C., Haida Gwaii is the ancestral territory of the Haida people (roughly half of the islands’ population today is Indigenous). Sea otters — known as Ku or Kuu in the Haida language, depending on the clan — are an iconic creature for the Haida, appearing in dozens of oral histories and depicted on countless totem poles. In one Haida history, a hunter kills a sea otter without giving thanks for its life. When he gifts the pelt to his wife, the sea otter springs back to life and swims away. His wife gives chase but is captured by a pod of SGaan, or killer whales, leading to an adventurous rescue.

For nearly a century and a half, the archipelago remained otter-free. But in the last decade or so, rumours began swirling that the charismatic creature had returned. Like reports of Bigfoot, there were intermittent sightings: usually of lone male sea otters, floating on their backs and munching on spiny urchins. The nearest population to Haida Gwaii was some 130 kilometres east, across KandaliiGwii (Hecate Strait) — a gruelling swim, even for a hungry otter. But in 2019, news broke that staff with the Gwaii Haanas National Park Reserve, National Marine Conservation Area and Haida Heritage Site, in southern Haida Gwaii, had spotted a female with pups: proof that sea otters had finally come home.

The sea otters’ return is often seen as a heartwarming conservation story, but it also brings its challenges. Sea otters are voracious shellfish eaters.

Lee looks down at the choppy water below, pulls down her diving mask and plunges into the long, tangled mats of kelp as thick as garden hoses. Below the surface, a whole different world opens up: golden-green kelp fronds wave in the currents, perch and sunfish dart among the leaves, and further down — barely lit by shafts of sunlight — is an understorey of more delicate plant life. Closer to the shore, a giant purple sea star and then a lion’s mane jellyfish, its fringe of orange tentacles floating beneath it. It’s an otter’s-eye view of a rich, diverse underwater forest.

After the urchins were removed, Lee says the recovery of kelp and other sea life was almost immediate. Bull kelp, an annual species that can grow up to 25 centimetres a day, took hold first, followed by other aquatic plants and marine life. The results fluctuated from year to year (the extreme heat wave in 2021 led to a die-off of kelp and feeder fish), but overall aquatic health has improved measurably. “It has started to evolve into an old-growth forest situation, where you have different species coming in and more diversity and different kinds of kelps,” says Lee.

When the project began, there was virtually no kelp or any other marine life, aside from the urchins carpeting the seabed in what’s known as an “urchin barren.” Without sea otters, this is what much of the coastline of Haida Gwaii looks like today. It’s no wonder, then, that conservationists get so excited by their return. It’s not just about a single species recovering — it’s an entire ecosystem coming back to life.

The Haida have always looked to the ocean for their food. Ancestral clam gardens — rock walls built in the intertidal zone to improve shellfish habitat — have been discovered dating back thousands of years. Likewise, studies of archeological middens (buried piles of shells, bones and other waste from Indigenous villages) have shown that shellfish and crabs have long been an important part of the Haida diet.

So how did they peacefully co-exist with sea otters? Evidence including oral history suggests that the animals were hunted, particularly near villages where shellfish foraging would have been most intense.

The hunt wasn’t just open season though. Otter remains in middens show there was a fairly consistent harvest of the animals over time, suggesting their population was carefully maintained. In other words, the sea otter population was managed. “This idea that sea otters were once-upon-a-time untouched, that they just were allowed to roam — we know that’s not true,” says Lee.

Sea otters have been off limits for hunting in Canada since 1911, when the North Pacific Fur Seal Convention was signed. They’re now designated as a “species of special concern” under the Canadian Species at Risk Act (they were down-listed in 2009 from “threatened” status). The idea of hunting them is highly controversial and runs counter to the “hands off” approach that typically guides Western conservation efforts. But the Haida, like many First Nations, see humans as a part of the ecosystem rather than separate from it. Hunting is considered a way of stewarding the environment. “We have an expression that goes like this: ‘Everything depends on everything else,’” Boyko says. “It’s one of the guiding principles of the sea otter management plan.”

The next step in the project will be using a computer model to simulate different management approaches. The model, developed through collaboration among several institutions, including the Council of the Haida Nation, Florida State University and independent consulters Nhydra Consulting, looks at the impact on kelp, urchins and abalone if sea otters were to return to Haida Gwaii without any human interference. Modellers will also test what might happen if a limited hunt is permitted, or if other non-lethal tools are used to deter sea otters from certain areas like important shellfish and abalone habitats. The model will predict how these scenarios might play out over time. Climate change, which is expected to hurt kelp, is also being factored in. The modelling results will then be used to gather more community input. “We’ll bring that information back to the community,” Guujaaw says, “and then start the process of bringing a plan to Haida leadership for direction.”