Nearly 300 years ago, one of the first researchers of the Kamchatka Peninsula, George Stelleronce wrote:

“Kamchatka lives almost solely on fish. If you hit the water with a spear you rarely miss a fish.  Fishing nets or seines are useless in Kamchatka for that reason.  It’s impossible to drag them ashore, they tear because ofthe abundance of fish.”

Many years ago, it seemed that the salmon would last forever.  However, today we know that all natural resources are limited, and Kamchatka’s salmon need protection.  So what is the current state of Kamchatka salmon?  The Kamchatka Branch of the Pacific Institute of Geography has published extensively on the topic. (more…)

A western gray whale named Flex has been receiving media attention worldwide for being the first of his kind to be tagged and tracked.  He is a 13 year old western gray whale that was tagged on October 4^th, 2010 by Russian and American scientists off of Sakhalin Island in eastern Russia.

His precedence is not the only thing gaining him fame though; his unpredictable path in the last four months has also been gaining him attention.  Scientists and researchers are baffled by his movements, but then again, they humbly admit they did not really know where western gray whales should be going in the first place. (more…)

I first met Arina Shurygina at the Keepers of the Salmon festival. It was amazing to see how much love she put into teaching about the salmon life cycle, its constitution, and peculiarities. It seemed that there was nothing more important to her than to teach each student how many fins a salmon has and the locations and names of each fin. Later, I learned that containers set throughout the town to collect plastic caps were another of Arina’s initiatives, but not the only one.

It was interesting to learn how it all began. Arina explains that, “One spring, at the outskirts of town, I realized that I was walking on a carpet of garbage. Snow cover was gone and garbage brought from nearby dumps had begun to surface. It was a very unpleasant feeling, but I wanted to fix it. I began to learn about different approaches to the problem that existed worldwide, and the possibilities available in the region. I discovered that in Kamchatka, and Russia in general, there is no general practice of sorting and recycling of household trash. I started to learn more about the issue and wrote articles to newspapers and journals. They were published but the situation still did not change.” (more…)

Almost every culture has a celebration to give thanks to nature for the previous year, the harvest, and the supplies stored for the winter. The Itelmen, one of the most ancient peoples of Kamchatka, call this holiday Alkhalalalai which is traditionally celebrated on the last weekend of September.  Recently this holiday has been celebrated in the Itelmen village of Pimchakh, after taking place for many years in Kovran, the spiritual and cultural center of the Itelmen people. This year, Alkhalalalai became an official holiday on Kamchatka’s calendar, a natural move, since the holiday unites all of the peoples of Kamchatka on one field, with no attention paid to population, age, or religious faith.

The celebration’s motto – “Here there are no guests, only participants” – came true from the very first minute of this year’s event. All of the guests were involved in the ceremonial cleansing of the hardships of the past year, and in the ritual feeding of Khantai. Khantai is the aboriginal god worshipped by the indigenous peoples of northern Russia and the Russian Far East. Aboriginals bring gifts to him since he rules the catch of fish.  Then they give thanks to him for the abundant catches.  The spirits were kind to the celebration’s participants and granted them a perfect, sunny day, even though the forecast predicted cloudy rainy weather, and it rained on both the day before and the day after the celebration. (more…)

This past weekend we were fortunate to attend the Golden Springs Festival, which celebrates the creative arts of the indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia, and Far East. The festival took place in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky.

The festival’s gala concert was held in the recently refurbished drama theater. The performers met their guests at the theater’s entrance, and the sound of traditional drums (known as bubins) and songs set a festive atmosphere. The concert opened with a performance by Mengo, a renowned Koryak national ensemble, which has represented the creative arts of the indigenous peoples of the north on some of the most prestigious stages in Russia and throughout the world. It was lucky to see them perform on their native Kamchatka. Mengo delighted viewers with its performers’ sharp movements, perfect figures, and dramatic dances, as well as the beauty of their faces and costumes. (more…)

I shot the following videos at Lake Azabache and in Bistrinsky Nature Park in central Kamchatka during a mid-July trip with my colleague Igor Goldfarb.

Here you can see a spawning stream filled with sockeye salmon as they complete the final leg of their journey to the spawning grounds. When I took this video, these fish had already traveled from the ocean, up two rivers, across a lake, and up several miles of this stream. The white fish have already spawned, and are beginning to die. The media portrays post-spawn salmon mortality as a romantic sacrifice, but the truth is far more gruesome: after completing their “duty,” the salmon literally begin to fall apart. The upshot is that the nutrients the salmon bring to Kamchatka’s rivers feed entire villages, an enormous population of bears, and even fertilizes the surrounding forest. (more…)

Back in July, Igor and I went to visit a partner who conducts anti-poaching patrols in the Nalichego Nature Park, not far from Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. We had to take a boat to his home within the park and, after a day-long tour, rode back to the truck to head home. As we turned a corner we saw the following image:

Right there, in the middle of a federal park on waters where any fishing equipment beyond a spinning rod is banned, we caught two men stringing a net across the mouth of a key spawning river.

I realized just how complacent poachers can be on Kamchatka, but it also revealed how a little support in the right places can significantly ameliorate the problem. Our partner in this park will likely catch several similarly complacent poachers this season. And if we can find more committed partners like him to conduct similar work, we can show poachers that their illegal work will not be tolerated by the locals who care the most about healthy salmon populations.

I have never seen so many insects in my life. Tiny black flies, quarter-sized mosquitoes and enormous horseflies competed to distract Tatiana Indanova as she crouched at the edge of a spring-fed creek in the 90-degree afternoon heat, using one hand to collect aquatic insect larvae, or benthos, while swatting the biting insects with her free hand.

Tatiana is a 21 year old college student and member of the Even tribe from the remote, indigenous town of Anavgai, where she is universally known as “Tanyushka.” Many college students Tanya’s age would look forward to spending their summers in dance clubs or at a lakeshore resort or pretty much anywhere but a mosquito-infested wilderness crawling with bears. But for the third consecutive summer Tanya is using her free months to mount one- and two-week expeditions to remote waterways in Bistrinsky Natural Park on Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula, where she collects samples of aquatic insect life that she later analyzes at her university’s laboratory to detect changes in water quality. Tanya’s project is supported by a grant from the Lach Ethno-Ecological Information Center, which conducts an annual minigrants competition with Pacific Environment aid. I was fortunate enough to accompany Tanya on the first of this year’s expeditions, which had us visit a reindeer herders’ camp, cross high mountain passes, camp at a riverside fishing village, swim in natural hot springs, and twice get chased by bears. (more…)

Kolya is the kind of boss that everyone at once prays they will have and dreads they will end up with. As a leader he is nearly flawless; knowledgeable, experienced, and deadly calm under pressure. As a teacher, he is all of these things, but also impatient, short-tempered, and sarcastic.

Kolya is the indigenous Even hunter and mountain man who led me, Tatiana Indanova, a PE partner who monitors water quality, two Muscovite botanists, his son Zhenya, and a local friend on a week-long expedition through the Kamchatka wilderness to conduct Indanova’s water quality monitoring project, collect samples of Kamchatka’s flora, and find some escaped reindeer.

From day one, I knew what kind of leader Kolya would be: as we packed our belongings into our saddlebags, I found myself standing around, unsure how to pack and not wanting to get in the way. As Kolya packed some of my things, he stopped for a moment to pull off his jacket. “Too hot?” I asked, hoping to strike up a conversation. “Yeah,” he replied with a grin, but looking me dead in the eyes, “because I’m not just standing around.” I still chuckle when I remember how he scolded his son’s friend for pulling in a net too slowly: “Pull harder, dammit, you’re not undressing a girl!” (more…)

When I saw this article in today’s New York Times I couldn’t help but think I was reading a translated article from a Russian newspaper – but, in 2015. And, why not? Nearly all of the corrupt policies described within the U.S. government in this article are already common practice in Russia, especially on Sakhalin Island, Kamchatka, the Russian Far North, and elsewhere.

Here’s just a sample of the checklist of items:

• Suppression of scientific evidence about the danger of proposed projects? Check.
• Ignoring harmful effects on endangered species? Check.
• Cozy relations between permit-granting organizations and the oil industry? Check.
• Foreign companies blatantly disregarding safety regulations? Check

(more…)