Atlantic Salmon
Salmo salar
Near ThreatenedFast Facts
About
The Atlantic salmon is a powerful, streamlined fish renowned for one of the most astonishing life journeys in the natural world. Hatched in gravelly rivers, it migrates thousands of kilometres out into the open ocean before returning, against all odds, to the very stream of its birth to spawn.
Its silver flanks and remarkable homing instinct have made it a celebrated symbol of wild rivers and clean water.
Behaviour
On its return migration, the salmon fights its way upstream against powerful currents, leaping waterfalls and rapids, drawing on fat reserves as it ceases to feed. Males develop a hooked lower jaw, or 'kype', during the breeding season.
After spawning, most Atlantic salmon die, though a few survive to breed again.
Did you know?
- Salmon navigate back to their birth river using smell and the Earth's magnetic field
- A leaping salmon can clear obstacles well over two metres high
- They stop feeding altogether once they enter fresh water to spawn
- The word 'salar' in its scientific name means 'the leaper'
Distribution
North Atlantic Ocean and the rivers draining into it in Europe and North America
