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Pacific Salmon Environmental Analysis

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Climate change has been clearly shown to affect Pacific salmon, and it has been generally seen to diminish salmon populations. In the Pacific Northwest, numerous salmon populations have been labeled as endangered under the Endangered Species Act. This is due to climate change warming the ocean, increasing sea levels, and changing flow patterns. It is predicted that salmon populations are only going to continue decreasing due to these changes in their environment. However, some researchers are arguing that Pacific salmon populations are actually going to show an increase in population size, and this is due to an increase in ocean temperatures causing a bottom-up effect that increases resources lower on the food chain, therefore benefitting salmon …show more content…

Furthermore, the authors studied numerous important environmental factors that may be harming Pacific salmon populations in various ways, making the results more precise and in-depth. They studied the effects of increased water temperature, changes in snow, and water flow on mature salmon as well as their reproduction and survival rates of fry. This article also gives suggestions on how to possibly decrease the negative impact ocean conditions are having on salmon, which is beneficial to know what action can be taken to make a …show more content…

It is asserted that this increase in the number of salmon is due to a bottom-up effect, which increases resources salmon need, benefitting the species and allowing a population increase. An increase in water temperature has been shown to increase zooplankton populations, and this gives salmon fry a higher rate of survival. As temperatures have increased, salmon also develop faster and stay sheltered longer, evading predators more. When the water is at a cooler temperature, there are less zooplankton, slower fry development, and an increased vulnerability to predators. This observed increase in pink salmon populations has lead this species to have a top-down effect on other salmon species. As the pink salmon numbers increase, they consume more prey and reduce the population of zooplankton, thusly decreasing the resource for other species of

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376 Words | 2 Pages

This had a huge effect on the planktons. Zooplanktons the eat phytoplankton. If there isn’t much phytoplankton for the zooplankton to eat, there numbers will decrease. The article “ The Short‐Term Impact of the Zebra Mussel Invasion,” “phytoplankton fell by 80 percent. Zooplankton (which eat phytoplankton) declined by half.

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1425 Words | 6 Pages

Mountain in the Cloud by Bruce Brown is a book outlining the cold hard truth about what we as human beings have done to salmon in the place that we call home. The wild salmon in the Pacific Northwest went from ruling the rivers, to rarely being seen. Bruce Brown gives clear reasons to the slow yet steady disappearance of wild salmon in the PNW and the consequences of such a thing, but also brings awareness to the larger picture of what's going on in the natural world. The main argument Brown makes throughout the entirety of the book is that wild salmon are going extinct due to human causes.

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532 Words | 3 Pages

The stickleback fish have gained much attention from evolutionary biologists because of their historic ability to adapt to conditions that were not favorable and to survive successfully in them. They are also able to give researchers insight into how evolution occurs in other organisms. The stickleback normally spawns in freshwater but lives in the salt-water ocean. Long ago when ice melted and receded, the fish were given new possible places to inhabit and they did, expanding their spawning locations to newly formed streams. Eventually, though, the streams were cut off from the sea and the once salt-water sticklebacks were faced with the problem of being stuck in freshwater with no way to get out.1

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944 Words | 4 Pages

Bill McEwen does not only use ethos and logos to express and reach out to the reader, but he also uses pathos. With pathos, the author can get into the reader’s mind and make them feel a certain way with his use of words. An example of pathos in the article can be easily shown when McEwen says” The reality is, our federal and state government will spend hundreds of millions-if not billions- of dollars in coming years on a program that will yield a salmon exhibit instead of a substantial fishery”(McEwen 9). McEwen’s use of pathos can be clearly identified in this phrase by looking at the way he states what he is saying. Here, McEwen does not use any facts or famous experts, but he does say this in such a way that the gets the reader really thinking

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1453 Words | 6 Pages

The Asian Carp Response in the Midwest states: “The presence of Asian carp in the Great Lakes could cause declines in abundances of native fish species. Asian carp will compete with native fish for food—native fish like cisco's, bloaters, and yellow perch, which in turn are fed upon by predator species including lake trout and walleye” (np). Another consequence is the poor quality of water that carp cause when they enter into new waters. They are known to be responsible for the unpredictable and disastrous results in habitats. As stated by Hansen, M. “Asian carp are like zebra mussels, which also prey on the base of aquatic food webs, and can thereby reorganize nutrient and energy flow with unpredictable consequences on native species” (np).

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422 Words | 2 Pages

The Northwest Coast’s main food source was salmon, thanks to the Pacific Ocean they had plentiful amounts of it. Fishing was usually done in the summer, and stored for the winter, but they were able to fish all year long. Although they did eat and catch other aquatic animals, including whales, salmon was the easiest to catch and the most convenient to store for long periods of time. The Pacific Ocean supplied the tribes with fish, crab, seaweed, whales, mussels, some sea mammals, and fish oil. The people had many methods of catching the fish, the most drastic one was by using harpoons.

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1321 Words | 6 Pages

The salmon has lived in the waters of the area for millions of years, and before humans inhabited the area, the salmon lived peacefully and was free to spawn and continue its lifecycle. However, when humans migrated to the Pacific Northwest, they brought new challenges for

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306 Words | 2 Pages

When I get out of school I wanna be pro fisherman they make so much money just to fish. That will be the easy way to make money and have fun while you doing it but there are sometimes that you will no have fun. When I get old I rather not fish I rather have a job that is in a office or something but i'll be okay with just fishing the rest of my life. There are many jobs out there in this world

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745 Words | 3 Pages

In the Spring the Walleye start to gain weight and during summer months there is a decline in J/g/day of growth that doesn’t increase again until the fall months. The severity of the decline in summer its impact on end of year weight depends on the increase in summer temperatures. The scope for growth for the Walleye has been studied by Kitchell et al. (1977) who found that around 23 °C Walleye’s energy towards growth begins to decline. Walleye are a cool water fish and temperatures can greatly affect growth.

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1214 Words | 5 Pages

It is becoming clear that the problems fish populations are experiencing are our own problems as well. Some factors of climate change affecting humans are heat waves, droughts, floods, and hurricanes. (Globalchange.gov) It goes without saying that droughts and hurricanes are not good things for people. With the rate that the earth is warming, these disasters will only become more extreme and frequent. Yes it is easy to deny the severity of climate change when it isn’t affecting you personally, but this will be a major concern for the years to

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459 Words | 2 Pages

And so have their ancestors. The tradition of them living off of the fish will be gone. Alaska has very clean water and that is why it is very rich in wildlife. If the Pebble Mine is approved, acid drainage will occur and leave the crystal clean water polluted with many bad chemicals. The chemicals ruin the salmon's sense of smell which will kill them.

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605 Words | 3 Pages

Some coastal habitats may disappear if organisms are unable to migrate inland because of topography or human infrastructure. This is expected to affect shorebirds and small forage fish, among other species. Warmer waters in regional estuaries, including Puget Sound, may contribute to an increase in harmful algal blooms, which could result in beach closures and declines in recreational shellfish harvests. Ocean acidification is also expected to negatively impact important economic species, including oysters and Pacific

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1422 Words | 6 Pages

High growth rates may also impose costs, including adverse effects on future development, growth, reproduction and swimming performance. Accelerated growth in response to previous food restriction provides evidence that growth rates are regulated. It suggests that fishes can ‘evaluate’ their achieved growth trajectory and adjust growth rates to buffer deviations from an ‘ideal’ trajectory (Broekhuizen et al., 1994). The expression of this growth regulation is dependent on several factors (Wilson and Osbourn, 1960; Ryan,

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884 Words | 4 Pages

Every year hundreds of species are diminishing due to the global temperature increase. From

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1437 Words | 6 Pages

One example is the Crown of Thorns Starfish. This starfish is very abrasive in clearing out a bunch of coral reefs. Being spiny and toxic it truly is a superior over small creatures and even if there are some of its predators, these predators are somehow over-harvested for consumption hence, affecting the food chain cycle. Thus, there would be an increase of their

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