Crew Log 10 – The Salmon Dance

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June 8, 2009 – Between Port Hardy, BC and Juneau
by Herb McCormick

At Sea/Port Hardy, B.C. to Juneau, Alaska (June 7):On Friday, June 5^th, the 64-foot cutter Ocean Watch made an unscheduled call at Alert Bay, British Columbia. It was meant to be a brief layover while skipper Mark Schrader paid a visit with an old friend, Emily Feffer, whose late husband, John Anderson, was a cherished sailing mate. Emily has worked as a teacher and counselor on the Namgis Indian reservation for three decades, and had alerted the islanders to our impending arrival. The Ocean Watch travels are meant to be a voyage of discovery. Little did the crew know, they were about to discover things that would make their hearts soar, and sink, in just about equal measure.
June 5 turned out to be a special occasion in the town, the day in which the students at the Alert Bay Elementary School would present their annual Cultural Celebration, with the whole community gathering at the “Big House” to watch the children perform the traditional dances that have been passed down through the generations. Not many visitors get a peek inside the Big House, the gathering place for the potlatches that are such an important ritual to the coastal Canadian tribes. But Emily had secured our invitation; astonishingly, we were the honored guests.

At the outset of the program, Chief William Cranmer acknowledged our presence to the crowd. “I’d like to welcome our special guests who are here in our house,” he said. “They’re looking at the oceans to see that we’ll continue-or try to continue-looking after our oceans. They arrived here in their big canoe. Will you stand up and be recognized?”

We did. And then we sat back down and were basically blown away.

The Big House itself was incredible. Twin cedar logs of massive proportion served as the main overhead beams, from which the vast ceiling, with a large open-air vent at its core, was suspended. In the center of the feather-flecked, hard-packed dirt floor, a crackling fire raged. Huge, colorful totem poles graced the four corners, with a pair at the front entranceway on one side and another set serving as bookends to the council of tribal chiefs and elders on the other. Yes, the building was remarkable, but it paled in comparison to what was happening within its walls.

The program was terrific, but it was the way in which the singers, dancers, drummers and narrators composed themselves that was truly memorable. They were respectful, deferential, sincere and talented. My favorite part of the show was the Salmon Dance, in which first the girls, and then the boys, entered the arena-all in elaborate costume-and proceeded to spin around the fire with joy and precision. Only later, after meeting a man we’ll never forget, did the young girl’s introduction that prefaced the piece really hit home.

“This year,” she said, “we’ve really learned about the life cycle of the salmon, and what that means. We’ve learned how important the salmon is to our survival.”

Chief Willam Wasden

The fact that the salmon industry in these parts is in the midst of what generously could be called challenging times is no secret. But after the presentation, outside the Big House, by sheer coincidence, we met Chief Willam Wasden, who told a chilling tale about another fish, the torpedo-shaped eulachon (pronounced “ooh-la-gen,” though it’s also known as a candlefish).

To the Namgis band, and other tribes of Pacific Northwest Indians, the eulachon is every bit as important as the salmon, but for somewhat different reasons. Local filmmaker Barb Cranmer’s extraordinary documentary, T’Lina: The Rendering of Wealth, provides plenty of background. For centuries, each spring after the winter melt, Namgis families ventured north to the mainland to a place called Knight Inlet to harvest the eulachon. The fish is prized for multiple reasons, but first among them is the oil it produces: “grease” in the native parlance. Boiling the fish to make grease is a rite of passage, an art that’s passed down through the generations, a cultural waypoint on life’s ongoing cycle, and the grease itself is distributed in big green bottles as gifts at potlatches, and is universally revered for its nutritional and medicinal qualities.

“It’s our sunshine in winter,” says one grease maker in Cranmer’s film. But due to habitat destruction by industrial logging operations, and over-fishing as a byproduct of the shrimp draggers, the eulachon numbers are in vast decline.

“Fish aren’t the only thing in danger of going away,” said another eulachon fisherman. “So is our way of life.”

Wasden has seen it firsthand. He grew up fishing for eulachon. A couple of years ago, after a particularly lean harvest, he witnessed something he’d never seen before.

“Even the animals are wanting,” he said. “The eagles are noble. They would never eat our scraps. You can even leave a punt full of fish by the riverside. They’d never touch it. They want it fresh. They want to catch their own. Especially the birds in the wilderness.

“But one day, we saw this eagle, eyeing the eulachon scraps. We watched him for about 45 minutes. He kept edging closer. He was hungry. The other birds were watching him. Finally, he went for the dead fish, and then all these eagles were fighting for them. Even the eagles are losing their pride and dignity.”

Wasden’s nickname is “wa,” an abbreviation of both his family name and his much-longer native handle. It means river. He seems young for a chief, but he takes his responsibilities seriously. He understands his people’s oral traditions of passing along stories, and songs, and is a sure, powerful speaker. As the afternoon progressed, Wa took us on a tour of the town’s rich U’mista Cultural Center, and talked knowledgeably and passionately about the artifacts, totems, masks and artwork that’s collected there.

That was the past. Afterwards, sitting on an uncle’s fishing boat near Ocean Watch’s berth, he got around to the present. He told a rugged tale.

Alert Bay was different when he was growing up. The kids had never heard of cocaine, could never guess what “cracking out” meant. But he understands. “The fishing industry’s dead,” he said. “There’s not a lot of opportunity here. You sit around here for a long enough time and you just want to escape.”

Yes, when Wa was 13, back in the 1980s, things were different all right. He remembers spending an afternoon fishing sockeye salmon with his dad. One afternoon. He earned a half-share of the catch, the fraction being the normal initiation fee your first year on the boat. His dad handed over five grand. A half-share. One afternoon.

“The harbor was so full of seine boats and gill netters and people looking for crews because there were just so many boats,” he said. “The money was great. The town was booming. People were happy.”

Different. I glanced around at the docks. There were plenty of small recreational boats, but the sort of craft Wa was talking about could be counted on one hand.

“About ten years ago the fishing industry really started to die,” he said. “The fish runs weren’t returning. When you can’t make money you can’t maintain your boats or your lifestyle, so a lot of people were pushed out of the industry. My uncle Stevie on Ocean Predator is probably one of the last ones that’s really comfortable in that industry who still fishes. But he’s such a hard worker. There are probably three boats here that still fish on a regular basis. It’s sad to see.”

One has to ask why, and while Wa had no sure answers, he certainly had some educated guesses.

“A lot has to do with the spawning rivers and streams,” he said. “The conditions aren’t right. The salmon are real delicate. If their home rivers aren’t in proper order then things aren’t going to work. You can see all the bark on the base of the river, because of the logging. They tow the logs down and all the bark settles on the bottom of the river. One of the elders showed me. He said they can’t get their eggs into the gravel. Sure enough, they watched and they observed and the fish were trying to push it aside, and they couldn’t.

“I think it has a lot to do with the environment,” he continued. “You open fish sometimes, like a dog salmon, and you can see cysts or welts on the meat. You can’t eat it. I opened one for my granny one time and she said, ‘Get rid of it.’ They’re diseased. Sick. Of course the sea lice are killing a lot of the fry, but that’s not the only reason. Something’s happening in the natural environment.”

First Nation people in the Pacific Northwest believe that what we know as “modern times” began with a great flood, reigned down upon the masses from The Creator as punishment for their disrespect of the land and the animals that ranged upon it. I wondered if Wa thought we were in for another big lesson.

“With the ozone layer and global warming, it’ll probably be that way,” he said. “But they say it won’t be a flood this time. It’ll be something different. Maybe fire. You see how hot the world is now? It’s probably going to be fire.”

As Ocean Watch’s crew took leave of Alert Bay, with deep gratitude for the amazing generosity of soul and spirit that they’d encountered, they were also left with one nagging, unsettling question: Will the kids still do the Salmon Dance once all the fish are gone?

- Herb McCormick with photographs by David Thoreson

*This crew log submitted by Iridium OpenPort and Stratos

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