Oregon has nine salmon-like fish

The word "salmon" brings to mind different things to different people. When you discuss the future of salmon and the Endangered Species Act, it's important to recognize the diverse kinds of fish in the salmon family.

Nine species of salmon-like fish are native to Oregon, but this group includes many subgroups with very different biological characteristics. The species:

• Seven salmon (all members of the scientific genus Oncorhynchus):
  • chinook
  • coho
  • sockeye
  • chum
  • pink
  • steelhead
  • cutthroat trout

    No breeding populations of pink salmon are left in the state, although a pink salmon occasionally appears in the Columbia River.
    

• Bull trout (actually a char and a member of the genus Salvelinus).
  
• Whitefish (genus Prosopium).

Biological differences within each of these species and subgroups of them contribute to the complexity of the salmon issue. Different forms of each of the above species have adapted to different aquatic environments.

For example, some forms of a species can be "anadromous," meaning they were hatched in fresh water but spend a large part of their lives in the ocean before returning to fresh water to reproduce. Yet other forms of the same species live in fresh water throughout their lives. For instance, rainbow and redband trout, which remain in fresh water throughout their life cycles, are "resident" forms of the steelhead species.

Also, some groups of anadromous fish travel from the sea into fresh water at different times of the year. Thus, there are "spring chinook" and "fall chinook" in some rivers. Sometimes these are called different "runs."

This publication deals mainly with the anadromous fish--chinook, coho, sockeye, chum, pink and steelhead, and, to some degree, the sea-run form of the cutthroat trout. Yet some of the principles described are relevant to conservation of all the forms of our native salmon-like fish.

The federal Endangered Species Act is meant to protect species, subspecies or distinct population segments. With salmon, maintaining the diverse biology and diverse forms of distinct population segments has been deemed essential to the fish's existence.

Generally speaking, the abundance of various species of salmon in the West varies from north to south. Pink, chum and sockeye salmon predominate in British Columbia and Alaska. Chinook, coho, steelhead and sea-run cutthroat are the major species in Washington, Oregon, Idaho and northern California.

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