I have read the orcas in the Pacific Northwest are somewhat at risk, due to various underlying issues (commercial transport, chinook shortage, etc.). If true, how (or what) would a free society do to preserve them? I'm assuming after a certain distance from shore, the ocean is nobody's property. So unless someone claimed a specific stretch of ocean, it wouldn't be a property rights issue.

So how would the market figure out how to protect the species, in the absence of charitable contributions?