Sonoma County Fifth Supervisorial District to partner in hosting sea otter awareness event on September 3

The public is invited to attend an event on Tuesday, Sept. 3 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Doran Beach to learn more about sea otters and the impact they have on our local marine ecosystem. The event will include a sea otter sand sculpture competition that will be judged by District 5 Supervisor Lynda Hopkins.

Representatives of the Kashia Band of Pomo Indians, Sea Otter Savvy, the Marine Mammal Center and others will be available at the event to be held at the end of Doran Beach Road in front of the “We Were Here” mural. The sea otter sand sculpture competition will take place at 11 a.m.

“We would like to continue to bring fun educational events such as these to provide the public opportunities to learn about potential sea otter reintroduction, which would not only be a restoration of a species, but a revival of ecological balance and health,” said Supervisor Hopkins, whose district includes Bodega Bay.

On May 26, 2023, Sonoma County brought together marine biologists, economists, tribal representatives, elected leaders, local environmental advocates and other stakeholders for a conference in Bodega Bay to explore the possibility and impacts of reintroducing southern sea otters to their former habitat along the Sonoma Coast.

“The successful restoration of a continuous sea otter population along the north Pacific Rim will require the active and sustained stewardship of all the human communities that form the links in that chain,” said Gena Bentall, director of Sea Otter Savvy, who was also a panelist at the summit.

Sea otters once thrived on the Sonoma Coast until the maritime fur trade of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries nearly drove California’s sea otter population to extinction. Sea otters are considered ecosystem engineers who help restore degraded coastal ecosystems. Recent studies including “Feasibility Assessment: Sea Otter Reintroduction to the Pacific Coast,” published by the U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife in 2022, have concluded that the reintroduction of the sea otter would have significant benefits to a variety of species in the marine ecosystem and would enable the recovery of the threatened southern sea otter.

A healthy sea otter presence can improve habitat health, enhance biodiversity, and make coastal habitats more resilient to the effects of climate change.

Additional benefits include:

• Positive impacts on businesses and local communities that benefit from ecotourism.
• Carbon sequestration by maintaining healthy kelp forests and eelgrass beds, which protect coastal communities from climate change's impacts by mitigating sea level rise and extreme weather events.
• Increasing the population and geographical range of southern sea otters, which are listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.

Sea Otter Savvy is a nonprofit formed as a result of collaborative efforts by Southern Sea Otter Research Alliance members from the Monterey Bay Aquarium, California Department of Fish and Wildlife, Friends of the Sea Otter, and US Fish and Wildlife Service.

For more information on Sea Otter Savvy, please visit their webpage.

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Media Contact:
Gilbert Martinez, Communications Specialist
publicaffairs@sonoma-county.org
(707) 565-3040
575 Administration Drive, Suite 104A
Santa Rosa, CA 95403