california
Well-Known Member
Exactly the problem with hatcheries and net pens - they avoid NATURAL selection. and produce adaptively inferior stocks. It has been shown hatchery smolts survive at a much lower rate than naturally spawned smolts. Not a good idea in an era of environmental change that only naturally producing organisms could adapt to, not farm animals. Not to mention hatcheries also bypass the natural selection that takes pace on the spawning grounds where the fittest adults get the best spawning locations. Hatcheries just randomly pick small numbers of spawners and breed them, often inbreeding them.These fish are not subject to the natural selection in river by bull trout, birds and seal that pedratate on weak immune compromised fish.
You are reinforcing my point, with the return of healthy populations of humpbacks (the apex predator for those food sources) there is even more competition for food. The young salmon migrating to the GOA are primarily eating invertebrates when they first get there so are competing for smaller food items. Adding in billions of pink and chum ranched salmon to the predator equation can only have a deleterious effect on other salmon populations.Anyone want to do a rough estimate on what an extra 19,000 humpback whales eat??? "An average-sized humpback whale will eat 4,400-5,500 pounds (2000-2500 kg) of plankton, krill and small, schooling fish each day during the feeding season in cold waters (about 120 days). They eat twice a day. "