Role of conservation biology in
fish hatcheries
Jesse Way, Simon Woods and Mara Brcic Bello
Outline
•
Background information and brief history of hatcheries
•
Types of hatcheries, differences between them, why we need them
•
Issues with hatcheries
•
Role of conservation biology
•
Looking forward
Hatcheries: why do we need them?
• Fisheries and aquaculture sectors employ ~260 million
people
• ~ $100 billion global trade (McClanahan et al. 2015)
• Fish essential to world food security (McClanahan et al. 2015)
• 17kg /person/year global mean fish consumption (FAO 2014)
Hatcheries: why do we need them?
• Marine harvests have plateaued (McClanahan et al. 2015)
• Collapse of wild fisheries (Pauley et al. 2002)
• Increase in farmed fish consumption of 0.7 to 7.8 kg
per capita between 1970 and 2008 (6.6% annual
increase)
(FAO 2014)
Year
(FAO 2014)
Ask the audience
• What is your general attitude towards the
concept of hatcheries and their practises?
Positive or negative?
Viewpoints over time
Spencer Baird, 1875 – Recommended fish culture
because he believed it would be the option to reduce
the impacts of habitat change, excessive harvest and
barriers to migration (Williams 2006)
Brown and Day, 2002 - The relatively poor success
rate of reintroduction and environmental issues
generated have led to a fierce debate regarding
hatcheries. (Brown and Day 2002)
Picture extracted from:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spen
cer_Fullerton_Baird
Hatcheries
• Facility where fish are
hatched and reared under
artificial conditions
• >300 Species are worldwide
(Brown and Day 2002)
• Purposes
• Food Supply
• Enhance endangered &
threatened species
• Research
Types of Hatcheries
• Commercial Hatcheries
• Conservation
Hatcheries
Pictures extracted from: http://www.tripadvisor.ca/LocationPhotoDirectLinkg181717-d155847-i44621927-Capilano_Salmon_HatcheryNorth_Vancouver_British_Columbia.html
History
Started in the 1800s
• Commercial use hatcheries
(Sharp 2001)
•
Believed to be the answer for all over-harvesting
problems (Sharp 2001)
•
1977 - Canadian Salmonid Enhancement Program
(SEP) started to try and enhance freshwater fish
survival
Salmon Enhancement Program
(DFO)
Focused on survival of Coho, Chinook and Chum in BC
Enhancement program includes
• Hatcheries
• Spawning channels
• Semi-natural fish culture structures
• Fishways
• Habitat improvement
• Education of locals
Commercial Hatchery
Restocking
•
Maximize productivity of
fish production
•
Release juvenile fish to
support commercial and
recreational fisheries
from:https://www.bchydro.com/news/conservation/2011/go-fish-bc.html
Monetary Value
Farmed fish have a huge
impact in BC’s economy
Economic Importance
Image extracted from Fish and Ocean Sciences Canada Stats
With success came doubt
• People started wondering the ethics of
having fish in a tank for part (or most) of
their life
• The main concerns were genetic diversity
and fitness depletion
Conservation Hatcheries
Reintroduction
•
•
Concern for the genetic
integrity of endangered
species
Ultimate goal is to maintain
genetic variability and fitness
seagrant.umn.edu
(Fisch et at 2012)
•
Added restrictions to maintain
viable populations
http://animal-kid.com/jumping-salmon-fish.html
c
(Flagg and Nash 1999)
Restrictions
Conservation hatcheries try to emulate
more natural conditions than commercial
hatcheries
•
•
•
•
Feeding systems
“Semi-natural” environments
Releasing times
Gene flow techniques
picture extracted from
http://bangordailynews.com/2013/11/09/news/down-east/salmonconservation-groups-watching-project-on-east-machias-river/
Restocking VS Reintroduction
Hatcheries Shortfalls
“Because of their large size and strong support from user groups (who rely on
hatcheries to provide fish for commercial, recreational, and tribal harvest as well as
jobs), hatchery programs tend to resist change” (Waples. 1999).
Three Major Shortfalls:
1. Genetics
2. Life Skills
3. Predator experience
http://www.pac.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/
Genetic Downer
• Decrease in genetic variability in a variety of salmon
(Cross et al. 1983)
• Incestuous fish! Inbreeding
• Founder effect and genetic drift
www.quickmeme.com
Genetics Rebuff
Founder Effect
Genetic Drift
www.beacon_centre_for_evolution.org
Genetics Shortfalls
● Aggressive?! Mixed reviews.
● Poor fecundity
● Size Matters
(McGinnity et al. 2003)
(Levin et al. 2001)
(Myres et al. 2004 vs. Olla et al. 1998)
Hatchery Salmon Arnt Smrt
Cohen 2012
Waples et al. 1999
Hatchery Salmon Are Dumb
● Poor spawners!
● Increase in straying
www.cartoonstock.com
Life History Shortfalls
Six Life behaviour shortfalls of hatchery fish:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Predator avoidance
Forage and processing food
Socially Interaction
Nests or shelters construct
Locomote on/in a complex terrain
Orient and navigate in a complex environment
(Kleiman et al. 1996)
“What is a predator?” Said no wild fish ever.
www.cartoonstock.com
Predators? Never heard of ‘em.
● No exposure to predators
● iPredator. Staggering results!
● 3 predator acclimatization skills
(Olla et al. 1998)
Luckily, some bears have never
heard of fish
Smart + Dumb = Less Smart
● Wild and hatchery salmon hybridize
● Hatchery fish have no natal imprinting
“Overall, Hatcheries fish reduce fitness and
inhibit adaptations of wild populations”
-Myres et al. 2004
Summary of Shortfalls
Hatcheries fish
have:
● Large bodies
● Aggression issues
● Desirable phenotypic traits
(for fisheries)
Hatcheries fish do
not have:
● Essential life skills (foraging, social
skills, nests, navigate complex habitat)
● A clue how to respond to predators or
how to avoid them
● Natal imprinting
● Sound genes (little variance)
Room for Improvement
• Shift priority from husbandry to improving
post-release behaviour survival
• Improve rearing habitats to allow for the
development of more natural behaviours
(Day and Brown 2002; Olla et al. 1994)
Borrowing a page from conservation
reintroduction science
Management techniques to decrease reintroduction mortality
• Environmental enrichment
• Life-skills training
• Hard vs. soft release
(Brown and Day 2002)
http://vecto.rs/design/vector-of-a-cartoon-fish-lifting-weights-and-wearing-afish-for-life-shirt-coloring-page-outline-by-ron-leishman-
Environmental enrichment
• Hatcheries devoid of
structure
• Must better resemble
natural environment
(Brown and Day 2002)
Life-skills training
• Alter behavior to prepare for the wild
• Look to terrestrial species for successful
examples
(Shepherdson et al. 1993)
What it takes to survive in the wild
1)
2)
3)
4)
5)
6)
Avoid predators
Acquire and process food
Interact socially with conspecifics
Find or construct shelters or nests
Move within complex terrain
Orientate and navigate in a complex
environment
(Kleiman et al. 1996)
Eat or be eaten: how to survive
• Avoid dangerous microhabitats
and behave cryptically
• Recognize and detect predators
• Antipredator response such as
schooling or fleeing
(Brown and Day 2002)
• Time required to become cryptic, wild vs hatchery fish
(Fig. 2 Kellison et al. 2000)
• Fish pre-exposed to predation have higher rates of survival
(Fig. 2 Olla et al. 1998)
• Even without direct
contact with predators
survival can increase
(Fig. 2 Olla et al. 1998)
Feed as the wild fishes do
• Predator avoidance is key, prey recognition
is too!
• Pre-exposure to live prey and even dead
prey can improve feeding rates upon release
• Skills can be learned quickly
(Brown and Day 2002)
Hard vs soft release
• Historical use of hard release
• Greater benefits with soft release
• Acclimatization reduces stress, improves
survival rates
(Brown and Day 2002)
Release site characteristics
• Much known about timing and location of
release
• Little known about interactions with release
site residents
(Leber et al. 1996)
Contradiction in management
• Conservation perspective: must first manage
any threatening processes
• Commercial perspective: threatening
process encouraged
(Brown and Day 2002)
Economic feasibility
• Lack of data on cost effectiveness
• Mixed reviews on rates of success
(Brown and Day 2002)
Looking forward
“Given people’s insatiable appetite for fish, one
must consider how much we are willing to pay
for the continued privilege of catching and
eating wild fish.”
(Brown and Day 2002)
Ask the Audience
• What is your general attitude towards the
concept of hatcheries and their practises?
Positive or negative?
Discussion
• Given that hatchery fish lack life skills, why
might they still outcompete wild fish for food
and/or habitat?
• How might hatcheries disguise ecological
issues in an aquatic environment?
More discussion
• In Pauley et al. (2002), Towards
sustainability in world fisheries, fishing is
compared to the hunting of terrestrial
species.
• Is this a fair comparison?
Even more discussion
• Thinking of the previous question, are
hatcheries ethical?
(Is mass producing billions of fish, knowing
nearly 99% will die, a good idea?)
Literature Cited
Brown, C., Davidson, T., & Laland, K. 2003. Environmental enrichment and prior experience of live prey improve foraging behaviour
in hatchery‐reared Atlantic salmon. Journal of Fish Biology: 187-196.
Brown, C. and R. Day. 2002. The future of stock enhancement: lessons for hatchery practice from conservation biology. Fish and
Fisheries 3: 79-94
Cross, T. F., and J. King. 2001. Genetic effects of hatchery rearing in Atlantic salmon. Aquaculture 33: 33-40.
FAO. 2014. The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture: Opportunities and challenges. Food and Agriculture Organization
Organization of the United Nations
Fisch, K., J. Ivy, R. Burton and B. May. 2012. Evaluating the performance of captive breeding techniques for conservation hatcheries:
A case study of the Delta Smelt captive breeding program. Journal of Heredity Advance Access Nov. 1
Fisheries and Oceans Canada. 2015. Fish Hatcheries in BC
Flagg T. and C. Nash. 1999. A conceptual framework for conservatio hatchery strategies for Pacific Salmonids. US Department of
Commerce : National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Literature Cited
Kellison, G.T., D.B. Eggleston, and J.S. Burke. 2000. Comparative behaviour and survival of hatchery-reared versus wild summer
flounder (Paralichthys dentatus). Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Science 57: 1870-1877.
Kleiman, D.G., B.B. Beck, J.M. Dietz, L.A. Dietz, J.B. Ballou, and A.C. Coimbra-Filho.1986. Conservation program for the golden lion
tamarins: captive rearing and management, ecological studies, education strategies and reintroduction. In: Primates:
the Road to Self-sustaining Populations (ed. K.Benirschke). SpringerVerlag,NewYork, pp.959-979.
Leber, K.M., S. Arce, D.A. Sterritt, and N.P. Brennan. 1996. Marine stock-enhancement potential in nursery habitats of striped mullet,
Mugil cephalus, in Hawaii. Fishery Bulletin 94: 452-471.
Levin, Phillip S., Richard W. Zabel, and John G. Williams. 2001 The road to extinction is paved with good good intentions: negative
association of fish hatcheries with threatened salmon." Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series B:
Biological Sciences 268.1472 (2001): 1153-1158.
McClanahan, T., E.H. Allison, and J. E. Cinner. 2015. Managing fisheries for human and food security. Fish and Fisheries. 16: 78103.
Meffe, G. Techno-Arrogance and Halfway Technologies: Salmon Hatcheries on the Pacific Coast of North America. Conservation
Biology. 6: 350-354
Literature Cited
Myers, Ransom A., Levin, S. A., Lande, R., James, F. C., Murdoch, W. W., & Paine, R. T. 2004. Hatcheries and endangered
salmon. Science 303.5666: 1980.
Olla, B.L. and M.W. Davis. 1989. The role of learning and stress in predator avoidance of hatchery reared coho salmon
(Oncorhynchisk isutch) juveniles. Aquaculture 76: 2091214.
Olla, B.L., M.W. Davis, and C.H. Ryer. 1994. Behavioural deficits in hatchery-reared fished: potential effects on survival following
release. Aquaculture and Fisheries Management 25: 19-34.
Olla, B.L., M.W. Davis, and C.H. Ryer. 1998. Understanding how the hatchery environment represses or promotes the development
of behavioural skills. Bulletin of Marine Science 62: 531-550.
Pauly, D., V. Christenson, S. Guenette, T.J. Pitcher, U.R. Sumaila, C.J. Walters, R. Watson and D. Zeller. 2002. Towards
sustainability in world fisheries. Nature: 478: 689-695.
Sharp, G. 2001. A brief overview of the history of fish culture and its relation to fisheries science.
Literature Cited
Shepherdson, D.J., K. Carlstead, J.D. Mellen, and J. Seidensticker. 1993. The influence of food presentation on the
behaviour of small cats in confined environments. Zoo Biology 12: 203-216.
Waples, R. 1999. Dispelling Some Myths about Hatcheries. Fisheries. 24: 12-21.
Williams, R. 2006. Return to the river, Restoring Salmon to the Columbia River. Library of Congress Cataloging-inpublication Data