Tag Archives: Sockeye Salmon

Which Salmon Is It?

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Over the past several weeks, I’ve been writing about Pacific salmon, so this week, I want to pause a minute and review. In their marine phase, the five species of Pacific salmon are hard to tell apart. Their life cycles are similar, and sometimes all five species spawn in the same river/lake system. What are their differences, and how do you tell one species from another?

Perhaps you are thinking, why should I care if I can differentiate between salmon species? Let’s pretend you are fishing in Alaska on a river where all five Pacific salmon species are present. It is legal to keep pink salmon, chums, and cohos, but you must release sockeyes and kings. You catch a beautiful, silvery salmon. You know right away it hasn’t been in fresh water long enough for its color and body shape to change. You also know if it is still silver in color, its flesh will be firm, and it will be good to eat. Is this one of the species you can keep, or must you release this fish?

The size of the fish is a clue, but often, different year classes of a species return to the same river, so size is not definitive. Does the fish have spots, and if so, where and how big? Spots are more visible when a salmon gains its spawning coloration, but if you look closely, the spots are visible in the silvery marine phase. Pink salmon have large, oval spots on the back and both lobes of the tail. Cohos have small black spots on the back and the upper lobe of the tail. Kings have spots on the back and both lobes of the tail. Sockeyes and chums have no spots on their backs or tails.

While you are looking at the tail, do you see any silver streaks? Cohos and kings have silver streaks radiating along the rays of the tail. Chums also have silver streaks but only on half the tail.

The mouth is another distinguishing characteristic. King salmon have a black mouth with a black gum line and a black tongue. Pinks also have a black gum line, but they have a white mouth. The other three species all have white mouths and white gum lines.

A chum salmon has a white tip on the anal fin, an important characteristic to note when trying to differentiate a chum from a sockeye.

Other distinguishing characteristics you can use include the size of the eye, scale size, and the shape of the tail, but none of these are easy to employ unless you are comparing one salmon to another.

Take a look at the salmon you caught. It weighs about four pounds and has spots on the back and both lobes of the tail. You think you see silver streaks in the tail, but you’re not certain, so you check the mouth and note a black gum line and a black mouth. You are allowed to keep the fish if it is a pink,  chum, or silver salmon, but you must release it if it is sockeye or king. Will you be able to grill this salmon for dinner, or should you carefully release it back into the stream?

The size of the fish, and the spots on the back and both lobes of the tail may lead you to jump to the conclusion you caught a pink salmon, and you can keep it. Only pinks and kings have spots on both lobes of the tail, so you can quickly rule out the other three species. The silver streaks in the tail may be hard to see, so you wisely check the mouth. Both pinks and kings have black gum lines, but only king salmon have a black mouth, including a black tongue. Take a closer look at the fish. Are the spots small or are they large and oval? If you said small, you have your answer. You caught a small, probably a mature 3-year-old king salmon, and you must release it.  

It takes practice to identify a silvery Pacific salmon in its marine phase. Commercial fishermen can quickly differentiate one species from another, but if you only occasionally fish for salmon, one silver salmon looks much like the next. If you can’t identify the salmon you caught, you must release it, so if you plan to go salmon fishing in Alaska without a guide, you should do your homework first.

Next week, I’ll write about some of the questions we are commonly asked about salmon, and I will do my best to answer them.

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I am excited to announce the webinar I told you about last week explaining how I became an Alaska wilderness mystery writer and where I get some of my ideas for my novels, has now been released. To see the webinar, follow this link: http://bit.ly/2pcCOo6. I used many of Mike’s photos and my friend, Ryan Augustine’s photos and videos in the webinar, so I think you will enjoy it. Please share the webinar link with your friends and family. If you stay until the end, you can get a free e-book of one of my novels. The purpose of the webinar is to introduce myself and my books to a wider audience, so the more you share this link, the happier I will be! Thank you!

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Sockeye Salmon and Humans

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Humans prize sockeyes for their firm, beautiful meat. A strong or weak sockeye run can mean the difference between fortune and poverty for commercial fishermen, and sport and subsistence anglers wait eagerly for the sockeyes to return each summer. Not only are sockeyes the ultimate fish to smoke, dry, or freeze, but they are good fighters and fun to catch.

As I mentioned last week, the complex life cycle of a sockeye salmon requires an extensive river/lake system. Sockeyes spawn in the stream or river, and then the fry move into the lake where they feed and grow for one or more years before heading out to sea. This life cycle works best when man does not interfere by building dams, logging, digging mines or developing land near critical salmon spawning and rearing habitat. Unfortunately for the salmon of Bristol Bay, the richest sockeye spawning grounds in the world, the rivers where sockeyes spawn are near one of the largest copper ore deposits in the world. For the past several years, Alaskans have been arguing loudly about the proposed Pebble Mine in Bristol Bay. After I describe the commercial and sport fisheries for sockeyes, I will explain the Pebble Mine debate in more detail.

Commercial Sockeye Fishery

 Sockeyes are the most valuable salmon for commercial fishermen. There aren’t as many sockeyes as pink salmon, but sockeyes are worth more per pound than pinks because their meat is firmer, they freeze better, and they have a richer flavor than other species of salmon. Bristol Bay in southwestern Alaska has the largest commercial sockeye fishery in the world. On average, fishermen catch ten to thirty million sockeyes each year in the region during a short, intense fishery lasting only a few weeks. In 2017, 59 million sockeyes were caught in Bristol Bay, and processors paid fishermen $1.13 per pound. The total sockeye harvest for the state in 2017 was valued at $326 million.

Certain regions of Bristol Bay are particularly productive. In 2017, commercial fishermen in the Nushagak region caught over one million salmon on two separate days. On July 3rd, during a storm and in heavy seas, fishermen landed 1.5 million sockeyes, and several fishing boats sank or became grounded when fishermen battled stormy seas while heavily loaded with fish.

Sport and Subsistence Fisheries

 Sockeyes are important to the economy of Alaska, not only because of the commercial fishery but also due to a growing sport fishery that brings many visitors to the state. One of the most important fisheries to the residents of Alaska, though, is the subsistence harvest. Most subsistence fishing is done with a gillnet.

Sport fishing for sockeyes is an art. Sockeyes eat plankton, so unlike cohos, pink salmon, and king salmon, sockeyes do not aggressively chase a lure. Fishing experts suggest the best way to hook a sockeye is by using a bare hook or a hook with colored yarn tied to it. The angler then catches the fish by either accidentally hooking it in its mouth or by aggravating the salmon with continual casts until the fish snaps at the hook. Once the fish is on the line, it is a strong fighter

 Status and Trends

While salmon stocks in the lower 48 have declined significantly over the past few decades, sockeye salmon stocks in Alaska are doing well. Due to their economic importance, sockeyes are carefully managed by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, but in recent years, the proposed Pebble Mine project near Bristol Bay has concerned many Alaskans about the future of the largest sockeye salmon run in the world.

The Pebble Mine is the name of a mineral exploration project hoping to gain the rights to mine a huge copper, gold, and molybdenum mineral deposit in the Bristol Bay region near Lake Iliamna and Lake Clark. This deposit is estimated to be the second largest of its type in the world. Those who support the mine say it will create jobs, provide tax revenue to the state of Alaska, and reduce American dependence on foreign sources of these minerals. Those opposed to the mine, claim it will pollute the Bristol Bay watershed, possibly destroying valuable fish stocks, including sockeye salmon. If that happens, the strong fishing economy already present in the region could collapse, wiping out fishing jobs and income.

Nearly every copper mine in the world has polluted the environment around it by releasing water high in acids and contaminants. Plans for the open-pit Pebble Mine propose to impound contaminated water, waste rock, and mine tailings behind several earthen dams at the mine site. This mine would be situated upstream from the Kvijack River, the river with the single largest sockeye salmon run in the world.

The controversy over the Pebble Mine has been a major issue in Alaska since the mid-2000s. In April 2009, a Native delegation from the Bristol Bay region told the mining company behind the Pebble project that the Bristol Bay watershed was no place for an open-pit mine. The mine was put on hold in 2013 after the loss of funding partners, but it has recently gained the interest of other investors and is now back in the news.

I will be honest; I am opposed to the Pebble Mine, and support for the mine is low in Alaska. Anything that could destroy the pristine environment where millions of sockeye and other salmon return each year to spawn should not, and I hope will not be allowed.

Do you have an opinion about the Pebble Mine? I’d love to hear it!

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Sockeye (Red) Salmon (Oncorhynchus nerka)

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Sockeye salmon also called red salmon and sometimes blueback salmon, are larger than pink salmon but average smaller in size than other Pacific Salmon species. Sockeyes measure between 18 and 31 inches (45.7-78.7 cm) in length and weigh between 4 to 15 pounds (1.8-6.8 kg). In their marine phase, sockeyes have iridescent silver sides, a white belly, and a metallic green-blue back. Due to this marine coloration, sockeyes are sometimes called blueback salmon. While they can have fine, black speckles on their backs, they lack the large spots found on other species of Pacific Salmon. The flesh of a sockeye in the marine phase is bright orange and firm. This beautiful, firm flesh with its rich flavor makes sockeyes highly prized and a culinary favorite.

When sockeyes return to their natal streams to spawn, their bodies turn bright red, and their heads become green. They are called red salmon because of this spawning coloration. In addition to changing color when they return to spawn, males develop a humped back, and hooked jaws called a kype. Breeding females are paler in color than males.

Unlike pinks, chums, and cohos that can spawn close to the mouths of small streams, sockeye salmon usually spawn in large, complex river/lake systems. Most sockeyes spawn either in streams connected to lakes or along the lakeshore in areas of upwelling. Because a sockeye requires unimpeded access to a lake to complete its life cycle, it is susceptible to habitat manipulation or degradation. Not only man but also beavers can alter a river system by building dams, effectively blocking a river or stream and denying salmon access to the lake.

The natural range for sockeyes is from the Klamath River in California and Oregon north to Point Hope in Alaska. In the western Pacific, sockeyes range from the Anadyr River in Siberia south to Hokkaido, Japan. Sockeyes are most numerous in the Fraser River system in British Columbia and the Bristol Bay system, including the Kvichak, Naknek, Ugashik, Egegik, and Nushagak rivers. Some populations of sockeyes do not migrate to the ocean but spend their entire lives in freshwater. These landlocked salmon are called kokanee salmon. Kokanees are found from Siberia to Japan on the Asian side of the Pacific and In North America from the Kenai Peninsula to the Deschutes River in Oregon. Kokanees have been widely introduced to lakes in the U.S., including the Great Lakes.

In Alaska, sockeye salmon return from the ocean to spawn from July to October. Like other Pacific Salmon species, sockeyes spawn in the streams where they were born. Some sockeyes spawn in streams not connected to lakes and others spawn near the lakeshore, but most spawn in streams attached to a lake. A female digs a nest in the stream bottom by giving several, powerful strokes of her tail. Once she finishes digging the nest, she rests while a dominant male courts her by nudging her side with his snout and then coming to rest beside her and quivering. The female then drops into the nest, and the male follows, stopping beside her. Both fish arch their bodies, open their mouths and quiver, releasing their eggs and sperm. Other males may also enter the nest and release sperm. The female will continue to dig nests until she has deposited all her eggs. She usually digs three to five nests over the course of three to five days, and she may breed with several dominant males. A female deposits between 500 to 1,000 eggs in a nest and lays a total of 2,500 to 4,300 eggs. A male sockeye may breed with several females, and both male and female sockeyes die within a few weeks after spawning.

Sockeye eggs hatch in the winter, and the young alevins remain in the gravel, gaining nutrition from their yolk sacs until spring when they emerge into the stream. At this stage of their lives, the young sockeyes are called fry and have dark, short, oval parr marks on their sides. Fry move out of the stream and into the lake where they spend one to three years in fresh water, feeding on zooplankton and small crustaceans. As they prepare to leave the lake, sockeyes lose their parr marks and turn silvery. They are now called smolts. Smolts weight only a few ounces when they enter the ocean, but they begin to grow quickly, mostly feeding on plankton, insects, and small crustaceans. A sockeye’s beautiful orange flesh comes from eating plankton and krill in the ocean.

Sockeyes spend one to four years in the ocean where they travel nearly continuously, covering as many as 2300 miles (3700 km) in one year. As it begins the return trip to its spawning stream, a mature sockeye swims even faster, covering 28 to 35 miles (45-56 km) per day during its last two months at sea. Sockeyes are prey for nearly every animal they encounter that is bigger than they are, and they are a valuable species for commercial fishermen.

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Next week, I will cover the commercial and sport fishery for sockeyes as well as the status of sockeye populations and threats to their survival, including the controversial proposed Pebble Mine in Bristol Bay, Alaska.

I would love to hear your opinions and ideas about the Pebble Mine as well as about anything else related to salmon conservation or any of my other posts.

My novel, The Fisherman’s Daughter, is now available for sale at Amazon and other online booksellers, as well as on my page at www.authormasterminds.com

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Pacific Salmon

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Five species of Pacific salmon return each summer to breed in Alaskan streams, rivers, and lakes. I will admit salmon are confusing fish. Not only do they have some of nature’s most complicated life cycles, but each species of Pacific salmon is known by two different common names. Are Atlantic and Pacific salmon the same fish? Which species of Pacific salmon is worth the most money to commercial fishermen? Do the various species taste different? Which species of salmon freezes the best? Why do some species grow larger than others, and why do salmon jump when they return to spawn?

Over the next few weeks, I hope to answer the above questions while I profile each of the five species. In this post, I will give you a generic overview of salmon and describe the life cycle of a Pacific salmon.

Pacific salmon and Atlantic salmon belong to the same family but not to the same genus. Atlantic salmon are more closely related to some species of trout than they are to Pacific salmon. One big difference between Pacific and Atlantic salmon is Pacific salmon only breed once, and then they die. Atlantic salmon return to freshwater to breed many times before they die.

The five species of Pacific salmon are pink salmon, also known as humpies; chum salmon, also known as dog salmon; red salmon, also known as sockeyes; silver salmon, also known as coho; and king salmon, also known as chinook. The five species look very similar to each other in their marine ocean phase, but once they enter fresh water, salmon go through significant physical changes, and each species has distinctive markings.

Fertilized salmon eggs incubate in the gravel of a river or lake bed for a length of time that varies depending on the species as well as other factors. Once the egg hatches, it is called an alevin. An alevin is small and has a relatively large, orange yolk sac attached to its body. The alevin receives its nutrients from the yolk sac and remains hidden from predators in the safety of the gravel bottom of the stream or lake. As the alevin grows, it depletes the nutrients in the yolk sac and begins to develop mouth parts.

Once the yolk sac is depleted, the young salmon leaves the safety of the gravel bed and must search for its food. At this point in its life cycle, the fish is called a fry. Except for pink salmon, a fry has parr marks along each side of its body. These marks provide camouflage to protect the fry from predators. Fry eat food such as insect larvae and plankton.

This is where the life cycle begins to get complicated. Fry remain in fresh water for a length of time which not only varies between species but may also vary between populations of the same species. Sockeye and silver salmon usually remain in fresh water for one or two years, while pink and chum salmon migrate to sea soon after they emerge from the gravel. King salmon fry usually stay in fresh water for one year.

Before salmon migrate to the ocean, they lose their parr marks and turn silver in color. At this stage of their lifecycle, they are called smolt. Once smolt leave their freshwater stream, they spend a great deal of time in brackish water where freshwater streams flow into the ocean. They feed and grow in the brackish water until they reach a certain size, and then they migrate to the ocean. Once they enter the marine phase of their lifecycle, they are considered adult salmon.

Adult salmon remain in the ocean for a variable amount of time, depending on the species and the population. King salmon can stay in the ocean for as long as six years, but pink salmon return to freshwater to spawn when they are only two-years-old. Once adult salmon return to freshwater, they undergo a dramatic physical change. Sockeye salmon, king salmon, and silver salmon turn dark red, while chum salmon develop calico bands on each side of their bodies. Pink salmon turn dark, and males develop a hooked jaw and a large hump on their back.

Salmon return to the stream or lake where they were born to spawn and die. At this point in their lifecycle, they are called spawners. Once the salmon reach their spawning grounds, a male and female form pair bond. The female digs a bed, called a redd, for the eggs in the gravel. She deposits her eggs in the redd, and the male swims over the eggs and fertilizes them with his sperm. She then brushes a light coating of gravel over the eggs. Once they spawn, all species of Pacific salmon slowly deteriorate and die, their bodies left to fertilize the stream or lake where they were born, ensuring the birthing grounds will remain rich in nutrients for future generations.

Every year, I watch salmon return to their natal streams to spawn. This summer, we had a huge return of pink salmon to the many streams on Kodiak Island, and at times when I sat on our boat, salmon surrounded me, jumping out of the water as far as I could see, reminding me of popcorn. I am always amazed by the incredible life cycles of Pacific salmon and how the many animals and plants on Kodiak Island depend on salmon to survive and thrive. As they return from the ocean, salmon are chased by humans, bears, eagles, seals, sea lions, sharks, and any fish big enough and fast enough to catch them. It is a wonder any salmon survives the gauntlet it must swim to reach its birth area and reproduce. Once it spawns and dies, the body of a salmon provides nutrients for the stream or lake bed and the plants and trees growing in the vicinity. It is impossible to imagine a Kodiak riparian ecosystem without salmon.

Next week, I’ll write about pink salmon, the smallest but one of the most important of the five Pacific salmon species.

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