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"Samantha and Steven saw baby river otters in the estuary over the weekend and sent us videos,” Nancy Newman, Sitka’s Administrative and Citizen Science Coordinator, shares with the team. “Make sure you have the sound on when you watch them.”
The whole Sitka team clusters together, oohing and aahing, as they watch a mother otter supervise swimming practice and guide her three wriggly pups out of the water and onto the shore at the confluence of the Salmon River and the Pacific.
“Oh my goodness! Steven even captured their little chirping!” exclaims Program Manager Maria Elting.
Portland-based artists and longtime collaborators Samantha Wall and Stephen Slappe, who first stayed at Sitka during Wall’s 2020 Jordan Schnitzer Printmaking Residency, were back in residence at Sitka this June. Wall recently served as a guest juror for Sitka’s upcoming 30th annual Art Invitational. Their reflections on being “Image Collectors” are documented as part of the Oregon Visual Arts Ecology Project, a project of the Oregon Arts Commission and The Ford Family Foundation.
“Sitka is such a special place, and this is just more proof of that,” Wall shares, reflecting on the otter sighting and the unique opportunity for artists to return to Sitka in different seasons, deepening their relationships with the Cascade Head ecosystem over time.
Watching the otter pups dip in and out of the seaweed and huddle together on the sand behind their momma against the headwinds, I can't help but wonder: If we were all as vigilant as this mother in raising and protecting the next generation, what would be different?
This newsletter contains a summer dispatch from Jake Simondet, Sitka’s Facilities and Ecology Manager, describing his first-year efforts and results encouraging pollinator growth at Sitka’s nature preserve. In the face of climate change and species endangerment, what can any one person do in a way that adds up? I hope you find as much inspiration in Jake’s work and writing as I do. With positive intention, collaboration and true grit, what matters most can multiply.
Thinking about the otters, and reflecting on Jake’s essay, I am reminded of first-time instructor Aidan Koch’s upcoming Environmental Comics workshop, which has been calling to me from Sitka’s catalog pages. This is one of several workshops this summer that will visit Sitka’s nature preserve.
“The intention of environmental comics is to position and support the environment as a significant character in our lives and stories rather than as a backdrop,” Koch offers. The invitation to explore environmental causes and effects through sequential story sparks my imagination. I see otters swimming frame by frame through a storyboard. I lean in to eavesdrop, wondering what the camas blossoms whisper to one another as they watch Jake, followed by elk, followed by bees visit them in time lapse.
For those who can, we hope to see you at Sitka this summer and share this place with you. From one-day workshops, which Program Manager Maria Elting highlights in this newsletter, to in-depth opportunities to immerse in nature, reflect and create, all are welcome here.
If you decide to take one of the last few open seats in Environmental Cartooning on July 30-August 1, you’ll see me there. I just signed up.
Alison Dennis
Executive Director
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