May 2013 - Page 18 of 21

Chickasaw woman making dynamic impact on her students

By Gene Lehmann, Chickasaw Nation Media

“If you can read this, thank a teacher,” the bumper sticker ahead stated triumphantly.
It takes passion to be a teacher. It takes devotion. It requires patience and it requires an understanding some students are going to excel in a vocational setting while others will earn doctorates. It is why this Sunday, America observed National Teacher’s day.
Chickasaw Ellen Brooker has seen all of this in 28 years of teaching and within her own family. She accepts it and celebrates it.

Bill Anoatubby said that Ellen Brooker is a great example of what a teacher should be.
“Ellen Brooker epitomizes the best attributes of a true educator, said Gov. Anoatubby. She does more than help students learn the subject matter, she inspires them to see every situation as an opportunity to learn and grow as an individual. She helps her students understand the importance of lifelong learning.”

The 2012 Chickasaw Nation Dynamic Woman of the Year recently came across a saying she loves: “Those who can — teach. Those who can’t — legislate. It just seems to reflect the issues that keep coming up in Texas education –my favorite saying when it comes to education is “All students can learn,” she said.
“We all have perceptions about what is fair and right and just. What we are envisioning is a perfect world and we don’t live in a perfect world,” Brooker said. At Southwest High School in San Antonio, Brooker has taught for 26 years of her career. Her enthusiasm for teaching and for her students grows exponentially each year.
“I am passionate about teaching history; passionate about American history and economics,” she said. For Brooker, history is more than remembering a smattering of important dates. It’s about equipping students to perform the task of critical thinking; of doing their own research and evaluating the problems and solutions to reach their own conclusions.
“The teacher who instructs critical thinking will give students the skills to be successful,” she states.

She challenges her students to not accept the norms of her parents, siblings, friends and associates. She expects them to research, discover, read, watch and determine for themselves what to believe and what to reject.

“I love my parents very much but my mother is a strong southern Democrat who votes a straight party ticket, and my dad is tea party,” Brooker said. “Consequently, we don’t visit about politics very much,” she explains with a hearty laugh.
What’s the best part about being a teacher? “Being there when the light bulb comes on and they get it, understand it and are excited about what they have just discovered,” she said.

What’s the worst part: “Some students just do not see the opportunities of education or how it will translate to a better life for them. They don’t work hard enough to learn and they miss opportunities that could have been available to them.”

Brooker is educated to the highest order.

Brooker has been an Outstanding American Teacher award recipient, winning grant writer, department chair and respected history and social studies teacher.

She has a master’s degree in Education with a specialization in instructional technology from Houston Baptist University and is certified in history and government, gifted and talented.

Brooker was recently chosen as a participant in the Library of Congress Teaching with Primary Sources Summer Teacher Institute and helped her department win gold performance awards for social studies.

An avid student of Chickasaw language and culture herself, Brooker incorporates traditional regalia and Chickasaw phrases in her classroom. She offers a unique study of Native culture, artifacts and storytelling in American Indian history. Brooker is the vice chair of the Chickasaw Community Council of South Texas where she assists Native American students and other community members in establishing tribal affiliation, learning about tradition, seeking benefits for higher education. Brooker promotes Chickasaw culture, tribal involvement and activities and fundraising to provide college scholarships.
She celebrates the diversity of education – even within her own family.
“My husband, Daniel, and oldest son, Shawn, tried college but decided that it wasn’t what they were necessarily looking for. Not everyone is suited for college. There are students who will excel at mechanics or welding because that is where their interests and passions are. My other son, Michael, is a computer geek – and doesn’t mind being called a geek. He will earn a degree in Internet security systems,” said Brooker as a way of illustrating education appeals to many different types of people with diverse interests and backgrounds.

North Dakota Visitor Center Honoring Sitting Bull Set to Open

Sitting Bull College/Standing Rock Sioux TribeSitting Bull Visitor Center in North Dakota — Sitting Bull College/Standing Rock Sioux Tribe
Sitting Bull Visitor Center in North Dakota

Source: Indian Country Today Media Network

American Indian Alaska Native Tourism Association (AIANTA) Member Standing Rock Sioux Tribe will partner with Sitting Bull College for the ribbon cutting and open house of the highly anticipated Sitting Bull Visitor Center on May 15 from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m./MST at the Sitting Bull College Campus in Fort Yates, North Dakota.

Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Chairman Charles Murphy and Sitting Bull College President Dr. Laurel Vermillion will conduct the ribbon cutting ceremony at the Visitor Center’s Medicine Wheel Park, with a musical performance by flutist Kevin Locke, a National Endowment for the Arts Master Traditional Artist.

“This was a joint project of the Standing Rock Native American National Scenic Byway, Sitting Bull College and the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe,” said LaDonna Brave Bull Allard, AIANTA Board Member at Large and Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s Director of Tourism. “The new Sitting Bull Visitor Center and Medicine Wheel Park is a dream come true for us.”

The Sitting Bull Visitor Information Center, operated by Sitting Bull College, will offer travelers information regarding local and special events, places to visit, a gift shop that will sell a variety of authentic Native American arts and crafts, and more. The Visitor Center is also the new home to the Standing Rock Tribal Tourism Office operated by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. The Tourism Office provides Tatanka Okitika Historic Tours offering individualized tours on a first come first serve basis and reservations are recommended. Narrated tours are given along the Scenic Byway in both North Dakota and South Dakota. Stops include the Sitting Bull Burial Site, Standing Rock Monument, Standing Rock Tribal Administration Building, Sitting Bull Visitor Center and other points of interest.

Allard added, “We look to Native tourism to help our nation become sustainable for the future of our culture and people. We honor our great leader Sitting Bull with a center that will bring healing to our nation.”

“AIANTA is excited for our member the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and AIANTA Board Member LaDonna Brave Bull Allard,” said AIANTA Executive Director Camille Ferguson. “This is an example of how tribes are helping define, introduce, grow and sustain American Indian and Alaska Native Tourism.”

For more information about the Open House or to schedule a tour please contact LaDonna Brave Bull Allard at 701-854-3698 or lallard@standingrock.org.

AIANTA is a 501(c)(3) national nonprofit association of Native American tribes and tribal businesses that was incorporated in 2002 to advance Indian Country tourism. The association is made up of member tribes from six regions: Alaska, Eastern, Midwest, Pacific, Plains and the Southwest. AIANTA’s mission is to define, introduce, grow and sustain American Indian and Alaska Native tourism that honors and preserves tribal traditions and values.

The purpose of AIANTA is to provide our constituents with the voice and tools needed to advance tourism while helping tribes, tribal organizations and tribal members create infrastructure and capacity through technical assistance, training and educational resources. AIANTA serves as the liaison between Indian Country, governmental and private entities for the development, growth, and sustenance of Indian Country tourism. By developing and implementing programs and providing economic development opportunities, AIANTA helps tribes build for their future while sustaining and strengthening their cultural legacy.

Gathering of Nations Dance, Drum Competition and Special Contests Results

Source: Indian Country Today Media Network

The 30th Annual Gathering of Nations pow wow and events held April 25-27 in Albuquerque, New Mexico was again a huge success. North America’s largest pow wow, held in “The Pit” arena on the University of New Mexico campus featured more than 3,000 Native dancers and singers representing more than 500 tribes and nations. Additionally, more than 800 artists and craftsman exhibited and sold their wares in the Indian Traders Market. Stage 49 rocked with the sounds of contemporary and traditional Native music.

A new Miss Indian World was crowned, Kansas Begaye, Diné, and she’ll serve until the 31st Gathering, scheduled for April 25-26, 2014. And when Hollywood superstar Johnny Depp, who will play Tonto in the upcoming Lone Ranger movie, sends a video greeting to those who attended, you know it’s a special event.

The Gathering’s official website has posted the results for this year’s dance, drum competition and special contests. They’ve also assembled an enormous collection of beautiful images from the event. Click here to find the results, with photos.

Lummi Master Weaver Fran James Walks On

By Richard Walker, Indian Country Today Media Network

Love was the common thread in everything Fran James did, whether serving her faith, hosting an unexpected guest, passing on a teaching, or weaving a basket, hat, robe or shawl.

She loved God and worshipped regularly at St. Joachim’s Church, where her passing was mourned May 2. She loved her Coast Salish culture, and taught countless others how to weave using cedar fiber, bear grass, or mountain goat wool. She shared her life and knowledge with everyone and taught all that wanted to learn, family members said. And she loved the company of others; her home was constantly abuzz with visitors.

“You have to ask why she always had so many people around her, what’s the magic,” said Darrell Hillaire, former chairman of the Lummi Nation. “The magic was ordinary love.”

Her view of how to live was simple: Love God. Love others. Don’t gossip. Keep your hands busy. Do your best.

“Her passing has left a void. The fabric that joins us together has weakened,” said Richard Jefferson, a nephew. “But because of all who learned from her, the fabric will grow strong again.”

James, who was known by her Lummi name, Che top ie, and by most people as Auntie Fran, walked on April 28 after surgery for a blocked artery. She was 88.

On May 2, a procession escorted her body six miles from Moles Funeral Home in Ferndale, Washington to St. Joachim’s Church on the Lummi reservation. Pallbearers carried her coffin up the flower-lined steps of the 1861 church, led by drummers and singers. Overflow seating was provided outside, with the funeral Mass shown on two screens.

After Mass, the funeral moved on to the Lummi Nation Cemetery. One by one, mourners dropped handfuls of dirt into the grave and offered hugs and words of comfort to the family. There was a mix of Native songs and Christian hymns, a melding of her faith and her culture. A priest said James had long prayed for the canonization of Kateri Tekakwitha, saying, “She was not only a devout Catholic, she was a devout Native American and wanted to see those two things together.”

The family hosted lunch at the Wexliem Community Building. Love offerings were made to the family, and the family gave gifts to all guests; among the gifts were art prints, beaded necklaces, and bundles of James’s fabric tied with a strand of spun wool—a reference to James’s favorite saying, “Weaving together the fabric of our lives.”

She was born Frances Gladys Lane on May 20, 1925 on Portage Island, Washington. She was raised by her grandmother there, where they raised 500 head of sheep. Her grandmother knitted and sold socks for about 25 cents a pair. Fran learned to spin and knit from her grandmother at the age of 9. She also learned to gather traditional materials and became a master weaver. Her work included twill-plaited cedar and cherry fiber bags; cedar and bear grass baskets of all shapes and uses; cedar hats; split and braided mats of cattail or cedar; elegant blankets and robes of handspun, twill-woven mountain goat or sheep wool.

She taught basketry and weaving at Northwest Indian College. She was a guest artist and instructor until her passing; events and venues included the annual Gathering of Native Artists at the Skagit County Historical Museum, the Northwest Native American Basketweavers Association, and the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture, which houses a collection of her work. Her work is shown in major Northwest galleries, among them Stonington Gallery in Seattle and Arctic Raven Gallery in the San Juan Islands.

Today, James and her son, Bill—a well-known artist and hereditary chief of the Lummi Nation—are credited with reviving and continuing the traditional weaving skills of the Lummi people. In 1990, the Washington State Historical Society presented Fran and Bill James with the Peace and Freedom Award for “[advancing] public understanding of the cultural diversity of the peoples of Washington state.” In 2002, Fran James was inducted into the Northwest Women’s Hall of Fame as “a nationally recognized Native American artist.”

Theresa Parker, Makah/Lummi, a niece, told of learning how to weave from her Aunt Fran.

“I used to love watching her weave with wool,” Parker said. “I told her, ‘We only have two or three wool weavers down here [at Makah]. That’s something we’re lacking.’ She said, ‘You can come up here anytime.’ ”

During one visit, James had acquired wool from 28 shears, each weighing 5 to 8 pounds. “We washed the wool and laid it out to dry in the back yard. It was such a sight, I’ll never forget that,” Parker said.

One of the sheep that had been sheared was named Henry; he was considered spoiled because his owner allowed him to wander wherever he pleased. As a result, his wool often had burrs that had to be removed.

Midway into removing the troublesome burrs, James told her niece, “Whenever you’re having a rough day, just remember Henry and you’ll get through it.”

In his eulogy at St. Joachim’s Church, Jefferson said his aunt’s work ethic made an indelible impression. He told of a time he and his sons took a load of wood to Aunt Fran’s home. She pointed to the place where she wanted it unloaded, and told them she’d stack it later.

“I was amazed. She was in her 80s then, but that’s how she was,” he said. “She wasn’t afraid of hard work. She was strong, confident and proud.”

Amid that indefatigable energy was humility. The Rev. Khanh Nguyen, pastor of St. Joachim’s Church, said James “put a lot of time and energy into the church. But she didn’t tell you about it. She never said, ‘I did this.’ ”

Throughout the day, people shared with each other what they learned from Aunt Fran, how her legacy will live on through those who follow her example and teachings.

Hillaire said James was not one for idle time or gossip. She only had good things to say about others, and would always end a thought about someone else with “God bless their heart.”

“Her legacy will live on through us and the lives we lead,” she said.

Addressing the vast crowd that gathered graveside to honor his aunt, Jefferson spoke of the importance of spending time and sharing love with others, as his Aunt Fran did. “Don’t let them be alone, go share a meal with them,” he said. “You have those teachings. Follow through.”

Fran James is survived by her son; sisters, Ernestine Gensaw, Rena Ballew, and Beverly Cagey; and numerous nieces and nephews. Her memorial program said she was also “culturally survived by many sons, daughters, nieces, nephews, grandkids, and great-grandkids.”

Tyler Fryberg takes the gold, qualifies for Special Olympics State Tournament

Killian Page, Isaiah Pablo, Tony Hatch, Tyler Fryberg, Drew Hatch, Donovan Hamilton

By Tony Hatch, Tulalip Tribes

May 5^th, 2013 was a rewarding day for many. Tulalip Tribal member, Tyler Fryberg swept all four of his events, qualifying him for the Special Olympics State Tournament. Marysville Pilchuck produced just about 100 student athletes to volunteer with this years’ Special Olympics, Regions/State Qualifier.

The boys volunteered to help every athlete, but had a special interest in fellow Tulalip athletes, Tyler Fryberg and Bruce Williams (not pictured). They were really happy to be there to help, but the amount of intensity that comes along with these athletes is amazing. They take their events serious and train very hard to compete and hopefully make it to the State Tourney, held at Fort Lewis. Tyler is not only a hero for people of Tulalip, but his fellow athletes, their parents and coaches make if clear that they enjoy watching him compete.

Tyler competed in four events Sunday, the Shot Put, 400-meter run, 100-meter, and the 400-meter relay. He swept all four events, bringing home four gold medals. Although, Tyler had his own cheering section of Tulalips, crowds would gather when it was his heat to race. Tyler pretty much dominated all of his events with the exception of the 400-meter sprint. This was very intense, as he was in second place for most of the race, but coming into the home stretch, Tyler turned on the afterburners and closed the gap on the leader, and with about 20 feet to the finish line, he passed the leader and won the race. This was a great finish to a great race and the crowd went crazy.

Bruce Williams also qualified for State, winning a gold medal in the 200-meter sprint, where he blew away his competition, by 40 feet or so. (Sorry Bruce, my phone went dead before I could get pictures of you, but we are very proud of you as well!)

We as fellow Tulalips are very proud of these guys and of course their fellow athletes for their heart and dedication. You are definitely an inspiration to the Tomahawk Athletes who were there, showing that with drive and determination, we can all be great. When 1 Tulalip succeeds, all Tulalips succeed.

Thanks you guys, for the great day, and good luck at State.

A shameful past: Indian insane asylum

Descendants on path of peace in Canton

Hiawatha Asylum for Insane Indians: The old building is gone, but a cemetery still is on the grounds of the Hiawatha Asylum for Insane Indians in Canton, today Hiawatha Golf Course. Hear people talk about needed improvements.

By Steve Young

May 5, 2013

CANTON — It is a long way to travel to mingle with the dead in a graveyard on a golf course at the east edge of Canton.

But Faith O’Neil and Anne Gregory come anyway, from California and Oregon, lured irresistibly by the echoes of their own ancestral past.

Long ago, long before it was transformed into the Hiawatha Golf Club, something much more dark and troubling resided where the fairways and greens lie today. Back then, at the turn of the 1900s and for the next 30 years, it was called the Hiawatha Insane Asylum and was the nation’s only such institution for Native Americans.

O’Neil and Gregory had grandmothers who were sent there. When they return now, the two women come looking for the spirits of those relatives, hoping for some supernatural revelation about what their lives were like in that place, and wanting to discern the often bitter truth about how they died.

The conversations, they say, can bring them to tears.

“Even though I didn’t know her in the physical world, I know her spiritually,” O’Neil said of her grandmother, Elizabeth Fairbault, who gave birth to O’Neil’s mother Sept. 8, 1926, at the asylum. “She’s with me at Hiawatha when I go there; I can sense her. And I’m bound and determined to find out what happened to her.”

A loose-knit group formed in the past seven to eight months shares that curiosity. Called the Hiawatha Indian Insane Asylum Action Committee, their members include Native Americans such as Bill Bird and George Eagleman, who work at the nearby Keystone Treatment Center in Canton; Yankton Sioux artist Jerry Fogg; and Lavanah Judah, who lives in Yankton and can count 15 relatives by blood and marriage who spent time at the asylum.

The committee is composed of white members, too, such as Lisa Alden, Canton’s Chamber of Commerce director, who said a history of abuse and neglect at the asylum brings her to tears. And Donna Dexter of Sioux Falls, whose search for the namesake of her hometown of Floodwood in northern Minnesota eventually led her to Canton and the tragic tale of asylum patient Tom Floodwood.

BIA is late to publish annual list of federally recognized tribes

Monday, May 6, 2013

Indianz.com Staff

The Bureau of Indian Affairs published its annual list of federally recognized tribes in the Federal Register today but once again it was late.

The Federally Recognized Indian Tribe List Act of 1994 requires the BIA to publish the list “annually on or before every January 30.” But the agency has missed the deadline for several years in a row — in 2012, it was published in August and in 2011, it wasn’t published at all.

In 2010, the BIA published the list in October and in 2009, it was published in August. The agency came close to the deadline in 2008 — the list was published in April — and in 2007 — it was published in March.

The BIA didn’t publish the list in 2006. In 2005, it was published in November.

The 2013 list contains 566 federally recognized tribes in the Lower 48 and Alaska.

“The listed entities are acknowledged to have the immunities and privileges available to other federally acknowledged Indian tribes by virtue of their government-to-government relationship with the United States as well as the responsibilities, powers, limitations and obligations of such tribes,” the notice in the Federal Register states.

View PDF here Indian Entities Recognized and Eligible To Receive Services From the United States Bureau of Indian Affairs

Native American activist Horse Capture dies

Native American activist, curator and professor George Horse Capture has died in Great Falls. He was 75.

The Associated Press

GREAT FALLS, Mont. — Native American activist, curator and professor George Horse Capture has died in Great Falls. He was 75.

Horse Capture, a member of the Gros Ventre tribe, died April 16 of kidney failure, his family said.

Horse Capture was an author, archivist and curator at the Plains Indian Museum at the Buffalo Bill Historical Center in Cody, Wyo. He served as assistant professor at Montana State University, taught at the College of Great Falls and worked for the National Museum of the American Indian at the Smithsonian.

But his foremost passion was for the Gros Ventre – also known as the A’ani, or White Clay People.

“What he did in his life, he did for his tribe,” Kay Karol said of her husband. “He wasn’t looking for fame or fortune. He was looking for a positive response for Indian people in a white world that still can be pretty discriminating.”

Horse Capture was one of hundreds of protesters who filled the abandoned prison grounds of Alcatraz Island in the San Francisco Bay in 1969, while 14 Native American protesters occupied the prison itself, the Great Falls Tribune reported (http://gftrib.com/18cwBXt).

The protesters demanded the U.S. government’s acknowledgement of its broken promises to Native Americans.

“I had to be part of it,” Horse Capture later told his friend Herman Viola. “I realized that history was being made. This was the first time tribes from across the country had gotten together for a cause – our cause.”

Horse Capture was born in 1937 and spent his early childhood in poverty on Montana’s Fort Belknap Indian Reservation. He moved to Butte as a teenager to live with his mother.

After graduating from high school, Horse Capture enlisted in the Navy. He later moved to Los Angeles, got married, began raising a family and was hired as state steel inspector for California’s Department of Water Resources.

Then the Alcatraz Island protest happened. Horse Capture wasn’t there for the entire 19 months the prison was occupied, but he said the experience still changed his life.

Horse Capture resigned from his job and enrolled in the Indian Studies program at University of California-Berkley. He became an intern at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., which was then working to develop its tribal archives.

Horse Capture went on to receive his master’s degree at Montana State University. In 1979, he was hired as the first curator of the Plains Indian Museum.

His passion was tracking down the lost artifacts of the Gros Ventre that museums and private collectors had snapped up. He located and cataloged as many of those artifacts as he could.

In 1994, Horse Capture was selected as deputy assistant director for cultural resources at the National Museum of the American Indian at the Smithsonian, where he was determined to make it a museum for Native peoples, not just about them.

“He was really putting this out for Indian people to take pride in the beauty and richness of their culture and traditions,” said Viola, now curator emeritus for the museum.

As he got older, diabetes and a weak heart began to slow Horse Capture down. But he finished his A’ani Tribal Archive Project, a massive digital collection of words, photographs and audio recordings.

In early February, at the age of 75, Horse Capture presented his work for and to the A’ani people, as well as to various institutions of higher learning across the United States.

He died two months later and was buried April 21 at Fort Belknap.

—

Information from: Great Falls Tribune, http://www.greatfallstribune.com

Increased congestion at Marysville/Tulalip I-5 interchange May 7-10

May 6, 2013 · 2:34 PM

Arington Times Staff

MARYSVILLE — Drivers who use the Interstate 5 off-ramps to Fourth Street in Marysville and Marine View Drive in Tulalip may experience increased congestion beginning the morning of Tuesday, May 7.

The Tulalip Tribes are working on a water line project on Marine View Drive just west of I-5. The project will reduce Marine View Drive at 31st Avenue NE to one lane in each direction around-the-clock from 9 a.m. on Tuesday, May 7, through 8 p.m. on Friday, May 10.

Drivers should allow extra time or consider using alternate routes between 11 a.m. and 7 p.m. on each of those days, when 900 cars per hour travel west on Marine View Drive. Backups could affect the northbound and southbound I-5 off-ramps to Fourth Street.

Washington State Department of Transportation traffic engineers will monitor the ramps throughout the closure, and adjust the interchange signals as needed. The overhead message sign on northbound I-5 near Everett will also be used to alert drivers to congestion at the interchange.

Drivers can use one of WSDOT’s many travel resources, including the Seattle area traffic map, with its Marysville-area cameras, and @WSDOT_traffic on Twitter.

Orcas attack gray whale calve in Monterey Bay

Killer whales hunt gray whale calves as they migrate across a canyon in Monterey Bay.

May 6, 2013

By PETER FIMRITE — San Francisco Chronicle

SAN FRANCISCO — Scores of killer whales are patrolling Monterey Bay, ambushing gray whales and picking off their young as the leviathans attempt to cross a deep water canyon that bisects their annual migration route.

It is a desperate situation for the migrating mother whales, which are trying to lead their calves through a gauntlet of hungry orcas to reach their feeding grounds in Alaska. Whale watchers and scientists, who are crowding onto boats to witness the action, have described it as the “Serengeti of the Sea.”

“It’s pretty scary and sad to watch, but this is nature,” said Nancy Black , a marine biologist and co-owner of Monterey Bay Whale Watch . “It’s a big battle, with the mother trying to protect her calf, and there is a lot of commotion and splashing in the water.”

Scientists say the violent drama, involving fleeing whales and pursuing packs of orcas, is an annual extravaganza of death off the coast of Monterey that is growing in intensity as the number of whales and orcas increase.

The mother gray whales and their calves leave their breeding grounds in Baja, Mexico, in April and travel north along the Northern California coast this time each year. As many as 35 whales and calves a day are swimming by right now, hugging the shore trying to elude predators, Black said.

The problem for the mothers and calves is that they must navigate around a deepwater depression, called the Monterey Submarine Canyon, at Point Pinos.

Transient killer whales, which at 22- to 26-feet-long are the ocean’s apex predators, congregate along the edges of the canyon, which starts a quarter mile from shore and is 6,000 feet deep in the middle. They wait for the big beasts — which are about 45-feet long — to attempt the crossing, kind of like crocodiles waiting for migrating wildebeests to swim across the Nile.

The more stealthy grays take the long way around, sticking close to shore and swimming through the kelp beds, but some of the more bold or hurried whales cut across the canyon, using sonar to follow the contour lines at the bottom.

“It is one of the few places on the gray whale migration where they have to leave the protection of the shore,” said Black, who has been studying killer whales since 1992 and is considered the Bay Area’s foremost expert. “The killer whales come in the area and patrol the canyon, searching for calves.”Most of the attacks occur along the edge of the drop off, where packs of between four and seven mostly female orcas use the cover of deep water to approach from underneath, said Black and other researchers. It is not an easy kill. The calves are 18- to 20-feet long, weighing many tons.

Working as a team, the “wolves of the sea,” as they are known to some Native American tribes, surround and harass the mother, separating her from her child. While she is occupied, other orcas batter and attempt to drown the calf.

“It’s pretty brutal,” Black said. “The mother will stay there trying to protect her calf and sometimes roll upside down to allow the calf to get up on top of her, but the only way they can save themselves is by moving toward shore. It takes two to three hours, sometimes up to six hours, to kill a gray whale calf.

“It is, say marine biologists, a spectacular example of the natural interplay between two of the largest, most dynamic, creatures in the sea and a sign that the ocean ecosystem is slowly improving on the Pacific coast.

The killer whale, Orcinus orca , is the largest, most intelligent of the world’s ocean predators. They can live up to 100 years — the oldest known orca is believed to be a 96-year-old female — but are highly susceptible to toxins, which accumulate in their tissues.

The animals, which are actually members of the dolphin family, were originally called matadors de ballenas, or “whale killers,” by the Spanish who witnessed them hunting the large cetaceans. The words got reversed when translated into English.

The distinctive black-and-white mammals have an incredibly complex, and remarkably stable, matrilineal social structure in which the sons spend their lives with their mothers, except for occasional dalliances with females outside the family group. Different groups feed on different things and are believed to have different languages and even cultures that are passed down through the generations.

The endangered southern resident orcas of Puget Sound, in Washington, feed on salmon. Offshore orcas eat schooling fish and sharks and the transients that frequent Monterey Bay prey exclusively on marine mammals.

Mammal eating orcas have been known to prey on birds and even terrestrial mammals, such as deer and moose swimming between islands along the northwest coast, but there has never been a documented killing of a human in the wild.

The Monterey orcas have been spotted attacking sea lions, elephant seals, harbor seals, dolphins and porpoises, but gray whale calves are especially coveted. Black said she has seen as many as 25 killer whales feeding on a blubbery carcass, which can take between 12 and 48 hours to consume.

The drama unfolding now along the Monterey coast was unknown to researchers until about 1992, when the once vast gray whale populations began to recover after being driven nearly to extinction by whaling in the 19th and 20th centuries.

The population rebounded from about 4,000 in the 1930s to 26,600 in 1999 , according to estimates by the National Marine Mammal Laboratory in Seattle . The recovery is nevertheless still shaky, according to experts. The number of grays dropped to 17,000 in the early 2000s as a result of the El NiÃ±o weather pattern and other factors that affected their food supply. There are now between 19,000 and 21,000 gray whales in the Pacific, according to researchers.

Forty of the approximately 140 killer whales that marine biologists have identified through their markings since 1992 have been spotted this year circling Monterey Bay, which marine biologists consider one of the best places in the world to study the creatures. They have, over time, noticeably learned from their mistakes and honed their hunting skills, Black said.

“The gray whale population has gotten bigger over the last 20 years and the killer whales have gotten better at hunting the gray whale calves,” she said. “It is a pretty amazing event and it all happens within 5 miles of shore.”