Developing a Juvenile Stock-Recruitment Relationship for Chinook Salmon

The main goal of this project is to develop a juvenile stock-recruit relationship for Yukon River Chinook salmon. Information about limits to production in the freshwater environment can play a key role in augmenting standard stock-recruit analysis.  Our second goal is to contribute to understanding about the extent that juvenile rearing habitat is limiting productivity at a given stock level which can then form the basis for setting restoration priorities. The objective of the proposed work is to extend an existing 6-year database of juvenile Chinook salmon density for small non-natal streams tributary to the Yukon River near Dawson City. Sampling in 2018 and possibly 2019 will take advantage of recent strong returns to the Canadian basin.  With an additional 2 years of data the relation between spawner abundance and subsequent juvenile density should be well established so that it can contribute to the goals identified above.