Homecoming
“The
Lummi Nation will welcome home
Sk’aliCh’elh-tenaut — their orca relative also
known as Tokitae — in traditional ceremonies to
honor her life and leadership,” read the brief
press release that landed in my inbox on
Wednesday, squeezing the breath out of my
body.
I’ve
been following Tokiate’s story for years.
Captured off Whidbey Island in Washington’s
Puget Sound as a young orca in 1970, she lived
in the same 80-foot by 35-foot concrete pool at
the Miami Seaquarium for more than half a
century, forced to turn daily tricks for an
enraptured audience. She was the last remaining
survivor of the 50 or so southern resident
killer whales captured around the time from the
Salish Sea and shipped around the world to serve
the entertainment industry.
Animal
advocacy groups and the Lummi Nation had been
pushing for Tokiate’s release for decades, but
the movement to free her gathered critical mass
in recent years after the National Marine
Fisheries Service extended Endangered Species
Act protection to the captive orca in 2015. In
2018, the Lummi Nation undertook a 27-day,
cross-country Tokitae
Totem Pole Journey to Florida demanding she
be returned to her family.
In
March, I was delighted to learn that the Miami
Seaquarium had agreed to let Tokiate go home.
But 50-plus years of living in the small, often
unsanitary enclosure had taken its toll on a
being meant to swim in the open ocean. On August
18, even as plans were being put in place to fly
her to a sea pen in the Puget Sound, within
calling distance of her family pod that includes
a 95-year-old
orca believed to be her mother, Tokitae died
unexpectedly of a renal condition.
As
she was drawing her last breaths in Florida, all
three clans of southern resident killer whales
met up in the Sound in a rare “superpod”
gathering. Tomorrow, Lummi Nation members will
hold a private, traditional water ceremony and
spread Sk’aliCh’elh-tenaut’s ashes at a sacred
spot in the Salish Sea.
It’s
not the homecoming those who worked so hard for
her release envisioned. But there is perhaps
some small consolation in knowing that Tokiate’s
life helped raise awareness about the plight of
captive cetaceans and of the southern resident
orcas, who face myriad threats, including
plummeting salmon populations, pollution, and
ship traffic. She brought together a community
of allies — the Lummi people, researchers,
activists, and supporters around the world — who
will continue the critical work of restoring our
relationship with our other-than-human
relatives.
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