Posts tagged: wild salmon

Only 10% of Mokelume River Salmon “Wild” Fish (or, Say Good-Bye, Native Populations)

February 15, 2012, by No comments yet

In what I’ll suggest is not good news for California’s beleaguered salmon populations, a genetic study showed that only 10% of the fall-run chinook salmon in the Mokelume River are wild fish (from the SF Chronicle: Mokelumne hatchery salmon outnumber wild fish):

Wild chinook salmon are so outnumbered by hatchery-raised fish in the Mokelumne River that scientists fear they would die out if left to their own devices. Only about 10 percent of the fall-run chinook that spawn in the river are naturally born fish, according to a genetic study released this past week. The dismal count of wild fish, which experts believe would be just as bad in other California rivers, means there are not enough native chinook to sustain a natural population in the river.

We’ve so decimated our wild salmon runs with hatchery fish — which offer the double-whammy of overpowering wild fish numbers while weakening their genetics — that in many cases, they wouldn’t survive without a hatchery.

Which only makes things worse.

See you on the river, Tom Chandler.

More Proof: Hatchery Salmon & Steelhead Actually Damaging Wild Fish Populations

January 3, 2012, by 5 comments

Another study supports the fact that hatchery salmon and steelhead experience relatively dismal survival rates in the wild — more ammunition for advocates for wild fish (and often, dam removal).

Salmon born in captivity become domesticated in as little as one generation, a new study finds, explaining why hatchery-born fish don’t do as well as wild-born ones in Oregon rivers.

Researchers created an enormous fish family tree using genetic samples from 12,700 steelhead trout (which are in the same family as salmon) returning from the sea to Oregon’s Hood River to spawn. This fishy pedigree revealed the fish that spawned well in hatcheries had offspring that spawned poorly in the wild.

Later, the article quoted a steelhead hatchery fish survival rate only 80% that of wild fish. And the concern is that “hatchery” genes — which result in higher reproduction in hatcheries, but far lower reproduction in the wild — would suppress natural steelhead populations.

In other words, wild fish good, hatchery fish bad. On a lot of levels.

The article makes some intersting points, and is well worth a read.

Salmon Fed Up With Impasse, Launch Direct Assault on Capital

June 20, 2008, by 8 comments

(Dancing salmon featured at Oregon capital Washing DC when legislation was introduced by Save Our Wild Salmon)

Technorati Tags: , , , ,

Fish Farms Lethal to Wild Salmon Populations Says Study

February 21, 2008, by 11 comments

A pair of Canadian researchers feel they’ve proved what most have long suspected; salmon "farms" are largely toxic to wild salmon populations:

DRAMATIC declines in wild salmon populations are associated with exposure to farmed salmon, a new study has claimed.

The research, conducted by two Canadian marine biologists, claims to show dramatic declines in the abundance of wild salmon populations whose migration takes them past salmon farms in Canada, Ireland and Scotland.

According to the authors, previous studies have "clearly shown" that escaped farm salmon breed with wild populations to the detriment of the wild stocks, and that diseases and parasites are passed from farm to wild salmon.

I know how the poor wild salmon feel — or at least I do every time I drive by one of those dairy feedlots in the Central Valley where the smell causes even your car to temporarily lose power.

Gotta be the same underwater.