Introduction
For my senior year in high school, my natural resources teacher offered to me a chance to do an independent study where I would spend my year raising King Salmon (also known as Chinook Salmon) from egg to smolt. The eggs would be more or less "adopted" from a nearby fish hatchery. We would set up our aquarium in the public library of our school where the most people would be able to view them. My purpose in raising them would be to learn as much as possible about their habits and their development and at the same time teach the public. This experience would also allow me to gain some hands on knowledge. If over 10% of them could surrvive to be released, I would feel as if I had accomplished the goal that I had set for myself: to keep at least as many alive as nature would have been able to. At the end of the project, when the salmon begin to smolt and are ready to imprint on their surroundings, they will be released into a stream that that DNR has designated as a release site for our area. From there they will hopefully live happily and grow to become mature fish and maybe even return to their release site someday to spawn and continue the salmon cycle!
