Supportive breeding boosts natural population abundance with minimal negative impacts on fitness of a wild population of Chinook salmon.

ABSTRACT: While supportive breeding programmes strive to minimize negative genetic impacts to populations, case studies have found evidence for reduced fitness of artificially produced individuals when they reproduce in the wild. Pedigrees of two complete generations were tracked with molecular markers to investigate differences in reproductive success (RS) of wild and hatchery-reared Chinook salmon spawning in the natural environment to address questions regarding the demographic and genetic impacts of supplementation to a natural population. Results show a demographic boost to the population from supplementation. On average, fish taken into the hatchery produced 4.7 times more adult offspring, and 1.3 times more adult grand-offspring than naturally reproducing fish. Of the wild and hatchery fish t

SUBMITTER: Hess MA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3490153 | biostudies-literature | 2012 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature