SEATTLE (AP) — Since time immemorial, as the saying goes, people in what is now Washington state and British Columbia, Canada, farmed the sea with a type of environmental engineering called clam gardening. But around the time Europeans arrived, the practice was lost. Swinomish Tribal Senator Alana Quintasket told KUOW the practice was stolen from them with settler colonialism. She says the tribe is now working to restore the practice. A study of dozens of ancient clam gardens around Quadra Island, British Columbia, showed that clam gardens grow four times more butter clams and twice as many littleneck clams as unterraced beaches do.
Swinomish Tribe builds modern clam garden, reviving practice
