THE ISSUE

Cook Inlet beluga whales - known as the “canaries of the sea” because of the many different sounds they make - are critically endangered! Following a rapid population decline during the 1980s -1990s, the federal government designated the Cook Inlet beluga population as depleted under the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA) in 2000 and endangered under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) in 2008. Once a valuable part of the regional Alaska Native subsistence diet, the Cook Inlet beluga population has not recovered and has declined by 75% since 1979—from about 1,300 whales to around 300 today. The threats that belugas face are numerous, and even though some aquariums in the United States are focused on studying and rehabilitating belugas, the best way to support these beautiful mammals is to help them in the wild. The belugas living in Cook Inlet are separate and distinct from all the other beluga populations, so once they are gone from Cook Inlet, they are gone forever, which makes our work more critical now than ever before.

AWA’s WORK TO RECOVER COOK INLET BELUGAS

AWA is taking an ecosystem-level approach to protecting these iconic whales before it’s too late.  That means we are looking at various factors, from both the beluga and human perspectives, and are taking a three-pronged approach. Learn more about how you can help support AWA’s work here.

1. We engage the human community through our outreach and educational programs as well as through our partnership with the Alaska Beluga Monitoring Program (AKBMP) for community-based scientific monitoring. 

2. We address the regulatory system to ensure the belugas have enough food to eat, especially in the spring when they are skinniest and most in-need of food.

3. We ensure that Cook Inlet’s waters, where these belugas spend their entire lives, are not polluted to the point it impairs their health and reproductive potential.

We cannot help the endangered Cook Inlet beluga whales without the support of generous donors like you. Donate here to keep our efforts going to save these whales for future generations to enjoy.

Humans are an important part of the Cook Inlet ecosystem, and we have a responsibility to be a Voice for Wildlife, especially endangered species like Cook Inlet beluga whales who cannot swim up to a meeting hall and advocate for themselves. In order to be effective advocates, we must be educated on the issues affecting belugas, and develop a passion to ensure the whales thrive. Sometimes it is very challenging to develop such passion if you do not get an opportunity to see these special whales in their natural habitat. 

Due to their declining population size, many Alaskans living around Cook Inlet have never even seen a beluga whale. Thus, AWA has developed several ways to try and connect humans with opportunities for viewing the endangered Cook Inlet beluga whales, focusing our viewing efforts on whales when they come into the Kenai and Kasilof rivers. 

Below are three ways we help you engage with Cook Inlet beluga whales so you can better advocate for their continued survival. We provide these opportunities to engage with Cook Inlet beluga whales at no cost to you, but if you would like to help us keep these programs running, you can donate here.

• We send out text alerts when we learn belugas are seen in the Kenai or Kasilof rivers. It’s free and easy to subscribe - simply text the word “BELUGA” to 1-833-541-0408. 

  • Note: If you have previously unsubscribed and are trying to sign back up, you will need to text the word “unstop” instead of beluga.

  • Terms and conditions apply. Click here for details.

• We partnered with the City of Kenai to install two BelugaCAMs on the Kenai River. You can watch for belugas from the comfort of your own home…or anywhere with your cell phone!

• If you spot belugas in the river, and we haven’t sent an alert - then let us know via our text alert system. You can just text us your observation to 1-833-541-0408, and tell us when you saw the belugas and on which camera and we’ll spread the news.

• Cameras coming soon!

• We co-founded the Alaska Beluga Monitoring Partnership (AKBMP), now a NOAA-led Program, to train community members how to become citizen scientists who monitor and collect data about Cook Inlet beluga whales for informing management decisions. There are multiple partners and monitoring sites around Cook Inlet - AWA co-hosts the Kenai River and Kasilof River sites. To learn more about AKBMP and to become a trained observer, go to AKBMP.org.  

Cook Inlet beluga whales are extremely dependent upon seasonal runs of anadromous fish, particularly eulachon in the spring and salmon throughout the summer. These same fish are highly sought after by humans as well. The belugas must eat a lot of these oil-rich fish in order to build up and store enough blubber to get them through the long winter when food is scarce. Having robust energy reserves is especially important for females who are nursing a young calf all winter. The spring eulachon run can be a life line for these whales, until the salmon begin running. 

NOAA has identified a “reduction in prey” as a threat to Cook Inlet belugas, and several recent scientific publications have concluded that if these belugas have enough food, then they can better withstand the other threats they face. Not only that, but with ample food, the population’s abundance could increase by improving their low reproductive rates.  

Below are some examples of actions we have taken, or are actively taking, to help promote recovery of Cook Inlet beluga whales by ensuring they have enough food to eat. If you would like to support our current and future efforts to reduce the threat of insufficient food for belugas you can donate here.

• AWA advocated on behalf of Cook Inlet belugas to the Board of Fisheries, and in 2024 we did something that has never been done before - we secured 100 tons more food for Cook Inlet belugas in the Susitna River in spring, a critical habitat and time of year for these whales.

  • 100 tons of eulachon is enough food to feed the entire population of Cook Inlet belugas for 11-16 days, during a crucial time of year when they are most hungry and in need of these oil-rich fish.

  • To our knowledge, this is the first time the Board of Fisheries has made a decision in the best interest of sustaining a balanced ecosystem, rather than focusing on economic benefits of a fishery.

• AWA has submitted a proposal to obtain funding to coordinate a multi-partner effort to conduct research in the Susitna River to try and determine the strength of the eulachon (aka, hooligan) run.

• There have only been three studies of this eulachon run, most recently in 2016 by ADF&G who only provided an indirect estimate of eulachon escapement for that one year. 

• If approved for funding, our research study will commence in the spring of 2025 and continue for three consecutive years. It will be the most robust study conducted to date.

• The study outcomes will provide critical information to both the Board of Fisheries and ADF&G for use in management decisions and determining allocative uses of these fish important to sustaining the belugas.

Cook Inlet beluga whales are marine mammals that do not leave Cook Inlet, so these waters are their full-time home. The belugas are exposed to whatever we dump into their environment, either by authorized/permitted discharges, such as from wastewater, oil & gas facilities, seafood processing, and cruise ships, or what is introduced into their waters through accidental spills, leaks or runoff. Some of the permitted discharges are granted “mixing zones” in which water quality standards are legally allowed to be exceeded.

Water pollution from contaminants entering Cook Inlet has been identified as a threat to the recovery of these endangered whales. Multiple studies spanning decades have documented the presence of numerous pollutants/contaminants in Cook Inlet waters, in the prey of Cook Inlet belugas, and even in the belugas themselves.  There have even been recent scientific publications suggesting water pollution may be associated with compromised health and low reproductive rates of Cook Inlet beluga whales.    

Over the past couple years, AWA has been working with partners to try and understand the extent and types of contaminants entering the belugas’ habitat. We’ve learned that many permits and studies only focus on localized areas of the Inlet, and do not take a comprehensive look at how much, what types, or where pollution is entering Cook Inlet. To our knowledge, no one has looked cumulatively across Cook Inlet at how the beluga whales may be affected by all the different sources of pollution. That’s where AWA decided to start - what are the belugas being exposed to on a daily basis as they swim around and forage in Cook Inlet? 

Below is information on our efforts to understand, at the beluga level and across the belugas’ habitat, what pollutants are being introduced into Cook Inlet, when, where, and how much, and which are most dangerous to belugas? Until we know that, we cannot effectively create a plan to reduce those most harmful contaminants.  Trying to answer these questions is a huge undertaking that cannot be quickly answered.  If you’d like to support our continued efforts to ensure belugas have clean water to live in, you can donate here.

• AWA initiated a mapping project to visually depict just some of the human-caused threats that belugas must endure throughout their range. One of the threats we included in the map was the approximate location of many, but not all, of the permitted mixing zones where industrial activities were allowed to discharge contaminated water exceeding water quality standards. 

  • We presented our preliminary findings in January 2023 at the Alaska Marine Science Symposium.  We think you will be as surprised as we were at just how much of the belugas habitat contains some kind of known threat to belugas, even when we limited our assessment to easily mappable threats. Click to read the abstract.

• AWA and one of our partners is currently conducting a deeper dive into details of all the permitted mixing zones in Cook Inlet.

• We are comparing 1) which contaminants are allowed to be discharged across all the different mixing zones authorized in Cook Inlet, 2) which contaminants the mixing zone permits require to be tested for in each discharge, and 3) which contaminants have been documented in the waters of Cook Inlet, in beluga prey, as well as Cook Inlet belugas. 

• We will be submitting an abstract in hopes of presenting our initial findings at the 2025 Alaska Marine Science Symposium. Preliminary results suggest that many of the contaminants found in the water, prey and belugas are not the same contaminants that permits require polluters to test or monitor.

• In October 2023, AWA co-hosted the first ever Cook Inlet Water Quality Summit, recognizing we had more questions than answers when it came to the status of the waters of Cook Inlet. Presentations covered what is known about the water, the health of fish and wildlife using the water, projects that may improve or reduce water quality, regulatory processes for the Clean Water Act, as well as a panel discussion involving policy makers from communities around Cook Inlet.

• To learn more about the Cook Inlet Water Quality Summit and see the full program book, along with copies of all the presentations, click here.

• AWA presented about Cook Inlet belugas. The abstract for that presentation is available on page 14 of the program book, and the full slide presentation starts on page 243.

• Donate to AWA! We all rely on grants, donations and other funding sources to continue our work (link to donation page)

• Sign up for text alerts by texting the word “BELUGA” to 1-833-541-0408. 

• Help us keep an eye out for belugas in person or on the Beluga Cams! Let us know when you see them, and enter your sighting information into the Cook Inlet Beluga Whale Photo-ID website.

• Help educate people by sharing information about these endangered whales, especially with boaters and people close to the beaches or riverbanks

• Help keep the Kenai River and Cook Inlet clean and safe for the whales and other marine life by cleaning up trash, plastics, rope, old netting, fishing line, gear, hooks, and anything else that marine life could ingest or become entangled with.

• Support AWA and the efforts of our partners to help this endangered population through activism.  Proposals and regulation changes often require public comments.  Subscribe to our newsletter to stay up to date and help us by speaking out for the whales!