North Pacific Anadromous Fish Commission

Technical Report 11

Table of Contents

Teaming up Internationally to Optimize Wild and Hatchery Pacific Salmon Production in a Future of Changing Ocean Ecosystems–the International Year of the Salmon (IYS)

Authors:
Richard J. Beamish

Abstract Excerpt:
I like to say that we know a lot about Pacific salmon, but what we need to know most, we mostly do not know. This means that we mostly are not able to forecast the abundances of returning adult Pacific salmon. Pacific salmon catches are at historic high levels, however there is no understanding of why the abundances continue to be so high or how long the high abundances will last. We are not able to make consistently reliable forecasts because we do not understand the basic mechanisms that regulate the population dynamics of Pacific salmon. In particular, we do not understand how climate and a changing ocean ecosystem will affect salmon abundances. In the past, we believed that adult abundances were most closely related to the number of smolts that entered the ocean. It was only a little over 20 years ago that we started to discover that ocean ecosystems profoundly affected production with impacts that were not random. We now realize that greenhouse gas induced changes in climate in the immediate future will alter ocean ecosystems, adding to the complexity of forecasting without an understanding of the mechanisms regulating survival in the ocean.

*This is the first paragraph of an extended abstract. Download the full abstract below.

DOI:
https://doi.org/10.23849/npafctr11/110.118

Citation

Beamish, R.J.  2018.  Teaming up internationally to optimize wild and hatchery Pacific salmon production in a future of changing ocean ecosystems—the International Year of the Salmon (IYS).  N. Pac. Anadr. Fish Comm. Tech. Rep. 11: 110–118.  https://doi.org/10.23849/npafctr11/110.118