Marine Mortality Schedules of Pink Salmon of the Bella Coola River, Central British Columbia

The hypothesis that natural mortality rates of pink salmon during early life are generally much larger than during the later period has been tested for 3 brood-years of the Bella Coola River stock using a two-stage marking technique. Average daily losses to the population during the first 40 days ar...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of the Fisheries Research Board of Canada
Main Author: Parker, Robert R.
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Canadian Science Publishing 1968
Subjects:
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.1139/f68-068
http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/pdf/10.1139/f68-068
Description
Summary:The hypothesis that natural mortality rates of pink salmon during early life are generally much larger than during the later period has been tested for 3 brood-years of the Bella Coola River stock using a two-stage marking technique. Average daily losses to the population during the first 40 days are estimated to vary between 2 and 4%, and for the later 410-day period between 0.4 and 0.8%. These rates produce losses amounting to between 59 and 77% of the initial population during the first 40 days. Of the population surviving at 40 days, further losses of between 78 and 95% occurred. The latter losses are considered to be maximum estimates because of bias introduced by catches of unknown magnitude. Thus, although the early mortality is exceeded by the later, the time period is approximately 10 times as long, and the intensity of the mortality rate is much higher during early sea life.