Darker cells mean a higher score for this topic on that metric.
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Quick answers
Do all salmon die after spawning?
Most Oncorhynchus (Pacific) are semelparous. Salmo salar can spawn more than once. The postcard of corpses on gravel is a Pacific-weighted image.
Why do forests need salmon?
Isotope studies show marine nitrogen in riparian trees and songbirds. Bears and eagles are the visible vectors; the trees keep the receipt.
What did the Elwha dam removals show?
After 2011-14, sediment flushed and salmon recolonised reaches above the old dams faster than some models feared -- a rare full-height teardown.
Are hatcheries a solution or a delay?
They keep harvest numbers up and can dilute wild fitness. The argument is now about proportions, not existence.
Why are Atlantic salmon a different politics?
Wild S. salar collapsed in much of Europe and New England. Farmed Atlantic salmon in net pens are a separate industry with sea-louse and escape files.
What is the Alaska exception?
Many Alaska runs are still large and limited-entry managed. That success is not transferable to a heavily dammed Columbia without the same habitat.
Anatomy overlay
Numbered teaching hotspots on the species still — not a clinical diagnosis.
- 1 Primary weapon or tool — The bill, teeth, trunk, pouch or talon that field guides name first -- and that trade or c
- 2 Energy store — Fat, cache, crop or bamboo hours that decide whether a season closes.
- 3 Natal or breeding site — A redd, eyrie, den, anemone or ice lair -- often a single-point risk (Izumi, Natron, Gir).
- 4 Sensory organ — Natal-stream olfaction is the famous sense. Polarised light and magnetite help the ocean l
- 5 Human interface — Hunt, tourism, film or quota -- the surface where salmon biology meets English-language la
Every salmon is a stack of tissues that must agree under season, prey and human pressure.
Meters below repeat the six atlas scores as gauges; they are relative marks, not laboratory certificates.
Systems
Support and integument
An adipose-finned salmonid with a kype in breeding males. Osmoregulatory gills and kidney switch twice -- downriver as smolts, upriver as adults.
Feeding apparatus
Marine fat built on plankton and forage fish, then spent on the upstream fast. Semelparous Pacific bodies become the forest fertiliser. The feeding kit sets the ecological-role score relative to the other 23 types.
Respiration and circulation
Gas exchange and blood flow are tuned to the salmon energy budget -- dive, hover, sprint or bulk browse -- not to a generic vertebrate template.
Senses and neural control
Natal-stream olfaction is the famous sense. Polarised light and magnetite help the ocean leg.
Reproduction and ontogeny
Replacement rate is the hidden resilience number. Dams, warm water, and a hatchery that smells like a factory. Climate-warmed rivers close the adult run before the gravel is reached.
Thermoregulation and salt/water
Climate and osmoregulation bound where a salmon can close its daily budget. Field sites in the English-speaking world still measure that envelope first.
Relative meters
Hotspots
Primary weapon or tool
The bill, teeth, trunk, pouch or talon that field guides name first -- and that trade or conflict usually targets.
Energy store
Fat, cache, crop or bamboo hours that decide whether a season closes.
Natal or breeding site
A redd, eyrie, den, anemone or ice lair -- often a single-point risk (Izumi, Natron, Gir).
Sensory organ
Natal-stream olfaction is the famous sense. Polarised light and magnetite help the ocean leg.
Human interface
Hunt, tourism, film or quota -- the surface where salmon biology meets English-language law.
Tissues & materials
Keratin and integument
Feathers, fur, baleen or skin plates -- tissues, not metals. Moult and wear are the maintenance cycle.
Bone and cartilage
Load paths for stoop, lunge, knuckle-walk or hover. Marrow and pneumatic bone differ by family.
Muscle and tendon
The expensive tissue that speed and intelligence scores only hint at.
Fat, oil and glycogen
Stores that migration, fast and lactation spend. A market for those stores (oil, ivory, fin) is a historical threat.
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