THE CALIFORNIA COAST is home to many beloved animals, from elephant seals to humpback whales, but one particular creature — the sea otter — has been largely missing from the coast for more than 100 years and now the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has asked Congress to look at the feasibility of reintroducing the playful member of the weasel family back to its shores.

Sea otters disappeared from the state’s coast due to the fur trade and even faced extinction, according to the Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS). They once thrived across the north Pacific Rim, from Japan to Baja California, but by 1911, due to hunting, only a few “small, disjunct populations” existed.

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Katy St. Clair got her start in journalism by working in the classifieds department at the East Bay Express during the height of alt weeklies, then sweet talked her way into becoming staff writer, submissions editor, and music editor. She has been a columnist in the East Bay Express, SF Weekly, and the San Francisco Examiner. Starting in 2015, she begrudgingly scaled the inverted pyramid at dailies such as the Vallejo Times-Herald, The Vacaville Reporter, and the Daily Republic. She has her own independent news site and blog that covers the delightfully dysfunctional town of Vallejo, California, where she also collaborates with the investigative team at Open Vallejo. A passionate advocate for people with developmental disabilities, she serves on both the Board of the Arc of Solano and the Arc of California. She lives in Vallejo.