Kiliii Yuyan Photographer

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Tlingit fur artist Christy Ruby heads home after a day’s hunt off Prince of Wales Island. As an Indigenous Alaskan, Ruby is permitted by law to harvest sea otters, as long as they are only used for subsistence or for traditional handicrafts. “I don’t take it lightly when I take a life,” Ruby says. “It’s ancestral. It’s in my blood.” Research supports the idea that sea otters learn to avoid danger areas and that Indigenous people once used site-specific sea otter hunting to protect shellfish areas.

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