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Four 18-inch male sockeye salmon, the first ever to return after rearing in the captive breeding program, have now returned to the Sawtooth Hatchery on the main Salmon River in central Idaho.
The first three-year-old salmon turned up at the hatchery weir early on August 12. The second sockeye arrived at the hatchery August 16 and the other two followed several days later. Idaho Fish and Game fisheries personnel are not sure how many more fish will be able to complete the trip from the Pacific Ocean up the Columbia and Snake Rivers, on to the headwaters of the Salmon River.
One sockeye, a wild male, came back last year. Since 1991, 20 sockeye have returned. All of those fish, until the latest arrivals, were born in Redfish Lake.
The adult males have been placed in a holding vat at the hatchery where they will remain while biologists wait to see how many more will arrive. The first two arrivals show a marked ventral fin, clipped adipose fin and a coded-wire tag which identifies them as having been among the 40,000 juvenile sockeye released into the Salmon River below Sawtooth Hatchery in May, 1998. At the same time, 20,000 juveniles were released at Redfish Lake Creek.
The fin-clips identify these adults as being second generation progeny of two female and six male sockeye which returned to Idaho in 1993. These fish, including the one that has returned all the way home, spent only one winter in the ocean rather than the typical two years at sea.
To minimize the risks in captive breeding of these endangered salmon, captive broodstocks are reared at Eagle Hatchery in Idaho, operated by Fish and Game, and at the National Marine Fisheries Service site at Manchester in Washington state. Progeny of these broodstocks are released into waters of the Stanley Basin.
Uploaded: 8/27/1999
Uploaded: 8/27/1999