Why This Tribe Is Buying Up 100s Of Acres Of Farmland — And Flooding It

"Scott Boyd walks through deep mud where the Stillaguamish River empties into Puget Sound, an arm of the Pacific Ocean.

This flood-prone river mouth north of Seattle changed dramatically in October when the Stillaguamish Tribe removed two miles of earthen levee. The ridge of dirt kept the river and the tides from spreading onto nearby farmland. Once a giant excavator bit into the levee to breach it, the tribe welcomed tidewater onto the land for the first time in over a century.

"Before, it was a dairy operation, and now it's a big tidal marsh," Boyd, a Stillaguamish tribal member and fisheries manager, says while looking out at the new 230-acre wetland."

John Ryan reports for NPR May 3, 2026.