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How do young salmon survive?

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This is a good question, and the answer is that many don't! To try to be a survivor, young salmon -- alevins, fry, and smolt -- seek out places of refuge in their freshwater environments, where they peek out to eat food drifting down the stream. These refuges are in small side streams or channels, under overhanging banks, in submerged tree roots, under logs and behind large boulders. They balance their need to eat with their fear of predators, and the survivors are those who ate enough without being eaten! As they get older, young salmon need to move to the ocean, and this need surpasses their fear of predators. So they abandon their hiding spots and begin the next challenge in their life cycle.

Professor Salmon