Wildlife

Along Alaska's Naknek River, belugas and spring go hand in hand

For residents living along the banks of the Naknek River in Southwest Alaska, the annual arrival of beluga whales chasing rainbow smelt upriver marks the transition from winter to spring. And for some, it also represents an opportunity to put food on their family's table.

Earlier this month, the river was already clear of ice, and locals say they've spotted the tops of the belugas' white heads on the water's surface and heard the grunting, sighing sounds of breaching whales.

During a phone interview in early April, longtime Naknek resident Sonny Wilson was in the middle of explaining life among the whales when he paused and said he could see -- from his vantage point at a kitchen window inside his home -- the belugas in the water at that moment. Wilson, who is Yupik, is one of just a few remaining subsistence whalers who hunt belugas in the region.

Alaska Department of Fish and Game biologist Lori Quakenbush said she doesn't have an exact count of the belugas that travel into the Naknek River every spring, or whether they're a specific subpopulation of Bristol Bay belugas. In general, she said, the Bristol Bay beluga population is healthy, abundant and growing.

Quakenbush said the region is home to roughly 3,000 beluga whales. By contrast, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration estimates the endangered Cook Inlet beluga whale population consisted of a mere 340 animals in 2014.

An updated Bristol Bay beluga whale population survey is scheduled for the summer of 2016.

Richard Russell, a retired Fish and Game biologist who lives in King Salmon who has been monitoring the Bristol Bay belugas since the 1970s, said an unofficial count of 452 belugas in the spring of 2013 marked the highest number of whales he'd seen in the river.

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Last year, Russell was unable to count the mammals, but noted they arrived on April 7, the same day the whales were first spotted in 2015.

For Wilson, the subsistence whaler, the sight of the whales in the Naknek River meant he needed to clean his 18-foot skiff. The Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972 does prohibit the take of marine mammals, but Alaska Natives can take belugas in the Bristol Bay region for food or to create traditional goods.

Wilson gets one beluga nearly every year. At 44 years old, he's been whaling for more than half of his life, using traditional skills taught to him by his father.

"It is part of my family," Wilson said. "I continue to do it because my dad did it, and his brothers did it."

The methods for capturing the 11- to 15-foot-long white whales have changed little over the years, but when done properly, one person can haul a half-ton or more of whale meat to shore.

"We chase them down with a skiff and you have to get one into shallow waters to harpoon it," Wilson said. "On the harpoon there is a 30-foot line with a buoy and when it takes off you have to retrieve the buoy."

To do that, Wilson said he has to get close, approximately 10 to 20 feet behind the beluga. When it surfaces in the shallows, he kills it with a bow and arrow.

"I found it kills the whale a lot faster than a rifle does, as long as you hit him in the right spot," Wilson said. That right spot, he said, is the animal's lungs.

Once the beluga is dead, Wilson ties the tail to the boat and pulls it to shore, where he cleans, cuts and distributes the whale so other locals can also enjoy the traditional cuisine.

"A lot of elderly people prefer the blubber; to me its a little too rich," Wilson said. "I don't mind the flippers -- there isn't much fat in them and they are chewier. If we marinate it for a day, boil it and barbecue it, it turns out very well. And also, it makes really good jerky."

Wilson has a seemingly endless number of stories about the belugas, both his own and those passed down by his family, but he's not the only one living along the Naknek River eager to share whale tales. For many, the belugas are details in memories and moments of their lives in rural Alaska.

Even today, people remember a spring more than two decades ago when a pod of orca whales followed the belugas up the river. Though it is not unheard of for killer whales to hunt smaller marine mammals such as the beluga, locals say it was unusual to see the predators hunting in such shallow, near-shore areas.

"I saw them eat one," Russell said of the killer whales and the belugas. "I saw them flipping it around in the air. There was blood in the water."

Tani Shoneman has lived in King Salmon for more than 30 years. She said it wasn't until she was an adult that she came to really appreciate the belugas. Now, she too watches them from the house. When she takes her dogs out at night, she said the sound of the belugas breaching is nearly constant.

Spectators don't have to live in Southwest Alaska to see or hear the whales making their way upriver. The Bristol Bay belugas can be viewed around the world using the online Naknek River camera.

Megan Edge

Megan Edge is a former reporter for Alaska Dispatch and Alaska Dispatch News.

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