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Spatial and trophic overlap of marked and unmarked Columbia River Basin spring Chinook salmon during early marine residence with implications for competition between hatchery and naturally produced fish

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Abstract

Ecological interactions between natural and hatchery juvenile salmon during their early marine residence, a time of high mortality, have received little attention. These interactions may negatively influence survival and hamper the ability of natural populations to recover. We examined the spatial distributions and size differences of both marked (hatchery) and unmarked (a high proportion of which are natural) juvenile Chinook salmon in the coastal waters of Oregon and Washington from May to June 1999–2009. We also explored potential trophic interactions and growth differences between unmarked and marked salmon. Overlap in spatial distribution between these groups was high, although catches of unmarked fish were low compared to those of marked hatchery salmon. Peak catches of hatchery fish occurred in May, while a prolonged migration of small unmarked salmon entered our study area toward the end of June. Hatchery salmon were consistently longer than unmarked Chinook salmon especially by June, but unmarked salmon had significantly greater body condition (based on length-weight residuals) for over half of the May sampling efforts. Both unmarked and marked fish ate similar types and amounts of prey for small (station) and large (month, year) scale comparisons, and feeding intensity and growth were not significantly different between the two groups. There were synchronous interannual fluctuations in catch, length, body condition, feeding intensity, and growth between unmarked and hatchery fish, suggesting that both groups were responding similarly to ocean conditions.

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Acknowledgments

Support for our research is through the Bonneville Power Administration and we are grateful for their long term funding of our efforts. We also thank the members of the Estuarine and Ocean Ecology group including Bob Emmett, Bill Peterson and Ed Casillas from NMFS and Cheryl Morgan along with numerous others from OSU who assisted in field collections, laboratory analysis, and database creation. David Kuligowski and Don Van Doornik (NMFS) collected the genetics data used in this study and Kathy Cooper ran IGF-1 assays. Megan O’Connor (OSU) assisted with the R programming. We would also like to thank Bill Pearcy, Barry Berejikian, and two anonymous reviewers for their comments which greatly improved the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Elizabeth A. Daly.

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Daly, E.A., Brodeur, R.D., Fisher, J.P. et al. Spatial and trophic overlap of marked and unmarked Columbia River Basin spring Chinook salmon during early marine residence with implications for competition between hatchery and naturally produced fish. Environ Biol Fish 94, 117–134 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10641-011-9857-4

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