As we look back on our 2021 season, we’re enormously grateful to all our guests for choosing Eagle Wing Tours and, through your donations, helping to support conservation, sustainability, research and education initiatives in and around the Salish Sea.

To say that the last two years have been challenging for all of us seems a huge understatement. We’re humbled by the generous spirit all of you have shown us, especially those of you in the Victoria region.

Thanks to your ongoing support, we continue to fund the important work that is helping to protect this spectacular ecosystem and its wildlife. It’s why all of us at Eagle Wing do what we do!

By coming out on tours with us in 2021, you contributed more than $116,000 in donations to a broad range of conservation organizations and initiatives in the region!

Since 2011, your donations have helped us raise a grand total of $788,919.41. In other words, we’re approaching the magic $1 million mark!

On behalf of the wildlife of the Salish Sea and from all of us in the Eagle Wing family—THANK YOU!

How did you donate?

• 1% for the Planet

As a member of 1% for the Planet since 2011, we donate 1% of our total revenue to a variety of hard-working organizations and projects dedicated to sustainability and environmental protection.

• Wildlife Fee

In 2013, Eagle Wing implemented a $2 per guest Wildlife Fee. This was raised to $5 in 2019. All of these funds go directly to conservation, research and education initiatives in the Salish Sea.

• Carbon offsets

We’re Canada’s first and only third-party verified 100% carbon neutral whale watching company. We purchase our carbon offsets from Wilderness International, with the money going toward habitat preservation in the Toba Valley north of Vancouver.

What did your donations support?

Here’s a round-up of organizations and projects we—and you— supported in 2021, listed by funding stream…

1% for the Planet

• 1% for the Planet membership
• Shaw Centre for the Salish Sea – Salmon life cycle display
• Saturna Island Marine Research and Education Society (SIMRES) – new hydrophone, seagrass monitoring, bull kelp mapping
• Marine Education and Research Society (MERS) – “See a Blow Go Slow” campaign and general support
• Goldstream Volunteer Salmonid Enhancement Association classroom salmon incubation program and general support
• South Vancouver Island Anglers’ Coalition Sooke River chinook salmon enhancement project. 2.5 million chinook smolts have been released since 2017!
• Bateman Foundation – a school bursary fund for “Nature Sketch” programs

• Sea Shepherd Conservation Society Victoria chapter – anti-commercial whale harvesting
• Sierra Club – habitat preservation for salmon, bears, wolves, eagles and more
• The Land Conservancy – local habitat protection
• SeaChange Marine Conservation Society – eelgrass and shoreline restoration projects
• Wilderness International habitat preservation in the Toba Valley
• Trial Island Conservancy Group – habitat preservation
• Pacific Wild: Protect Pacific Herring campaign and advocacy for wild wolves
• Wild 4 Whales Foundation marine research and education initiatives

Wildlife Fee

• Bay Cetology – ongoing database on Bigg’s killer whales, live hydrophone system
• Center for Whale Research – ongoing wild killer whale identification and monitoring
• Porpoise Conservation Society – regional and global porpoise conservation and research
• Pacific Salmon Foundation – chinook salmon enhancement projects
• South Vancouver Island Anglers’ Coalition – Sooke River chinook salmon enhancement project. 2.5 million chinook smolts have been released since 2017!
• Peninsula Streams Society – beach and salmon spawning habitat restoration projects
• Cowichan Lake Salmonid Enhancement Society & Hatchery classroom salmon incubation program and general support
• World Fisheries Trust herring research and enhancement
• Wild 4 Whales Foundation marine research and education initiatives
• Wilderness International habitat preservation in the Toba Valley
• Race Rocks Ecological Reserve – upgrades to solar panels, generator batteries, desalination system
• Eagle Wing’s “Exploring the Salish Sea” floating classroom education program – creating a connection between youth and the Salish Sea. To date, 4,000 local schoolchildren have completed the program, which will be expanded in the coming years
• Mark Leiren-Young – production of a documentary on “Moby Doll,” a significant story in the history of the human-killer whale relationship in this region.

Carbon offsets

• Synergy Foundation Sustainability monitoring
• Wilderness International habitat preservation in the Toba Valley; for every $1 raised we offset one square kilometre of old-growth forest!

Join us on a tour in 2022 and make your contribution to conservation in the Salish Sea. Help us reach the $1 million mark!

To book your tour, give us a call or book online!

Blog published March 27, 2022