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Coho Salmon
Oncorhynchus kisutch
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RON PITTARD GRAPHICS
TEXT BY JOHN RANDOLPH
Silver salmon, or coho (Onchorhynchus kisutch), are a
medium-size salmon, one of five Pacific species that
have evolved over roughly the past 50 million years from
the coast of California north to the Kuskokwim basin and
Point Hope in Alaska. They also range from Hokkaido in
Japan north to the Anadyr River in Kamchatka. They are
anadromous fish, spawning in fresh water, hatching from
eggs spawned into the gravel, rearing for one year in
the river, then in spring smoltifying and running to the
sea for two years and returning to spawn and die as
adults. Their Homeric lifecycle brings nutrients from
the sea to the land, as five anadromous salmonid species
return to Alaskan rivers in summer and fall to spawn and
recharge a vast ecosystem with lifegiving death.
Silvers prefer short coastal streams and are especially
abundant on Kodiak Island, the North Gulf Coast, and
southeast Alaska, where there are more than 2,000 rivers
with spawning runs. The Kuskokwim drainage has the
largest runs of silvers, with as many as one million
running to spawn in peak years.
Silvers are preferred by fly fishers because they take
the fly hard, and they are aggressive toward drys
(especially pink deer-hair Pollywogs) skated across the
fish's holding lies. They fight and jump like rainbows,
to which they are closely related. Their upstream
spawning migrations can run from mid-July through
October in Alaska, and they provide that last
bittersweet touch of seasonal fishing drama for the fly
fisher.
Historically, the largest silvers (up to 30 pounds) came
from southeast Alaska and British Columbia rivers, but
since introductions of the species to the Great Lakes in
the 1950s (to help control rampant alewife populations)
larger specimens have been taken there. The current IGFA
world record is a 33-pound Lake Erie kahuna taken on the
Salmon River at Pulaski, New York.
In the rivers near Cordova, Alaska, including the mighty
Copper River drainage, silvers continue to thrive
because their habitats have not been destroyed and they
are not overharvested at sea or in the rivers.
Unfortunately, that is not the case in the Northwest and
British Columbia. Eighteen Columbia River silver
populations have been listed by U.S. fisheries
scientists as extinct due to dam building, habitat
destruction, and overfishing. And 34 silver populations
from northern California to the state of Washington are
at risk. In the past decade, British Columbia's Skeena
River silver populations have collapsed. Their recovery
is doubtful.
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