Integrated Salmon Hatcheries Can Pose Less Genetic Risk to Wild Populations Than Segregated Programs, Given Imperfect Implementation.

ABSTRACT: Hatchery programs can provide fishery and conservation benefits, but can also inadvertently threaten wild populations through genetic and ecological interactions. Two common, and non-mutually exclusive, strategies for mitigating the genetic impacts of hatchery programs on wild populations are reducing the number of hatchery-origin fish spawning in the wild and integrating wild-origin individuals into the hatchery broodstock. We compared the robustness of these two strategies to imperfect implementation (variation around target proportions of hatchery-origin spawners in the wild and wild-origin brood stock) using a quantitative population genetic model. Simulations revealed that incorporating wild-origin broodstock was more robust to both short- and long-term implementation errors compared

SUBMITTER: Buckner JH 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12670298 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature