Wildlife
Sockeye salmon live in the northern Pacific Ocean, but breed in freshwater. They return to the freshwater systems of their birth in June and July, guided home by the characteristic odour of their parent stream. During spawning, each female deposits 2,000 eggs then both the males and females die soon after. Young salmon mature in the freshwater nurseries, and at two years of age finally depart for the open ocean. There are also landlocked populations of the sockeye that never return to the sea.
Scientific name: Oncorhynchus nerka
Rank: Species
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August feast
Migrating salmon must always run the gauntlet of the waiting bears.
Migrating salmon must always run the gauntlet of the waiting bears.
Final destination
Exhausted sockeye salmon go the extra mile to reach their spawning grounds.
Exhausted sockeye salmon go the extra mile to reach their spawning grounds.
The Sockeye salmon can be found in a number of locations including: Asia, North America, Russia. Find out more about these places and what else lives there.
The following habitats are found across the Sockeye salmon distribution range. Find out more about these environments, what it takes to live there and what else inhabits them.
Discover what these behaviours are and how different plants and animals use them.
Additional data source: Animal Diversity Web
Least Concern
Population trend: Stable
Year assessed: 2008
Classified by: IUCN 3.1
Sockeye salmon (Oncorhynchus nerka), also called red salmon or blueback salmon in the United States, is an anadromous species of salmon found in the Northern Pacific Ocean and rivers discharging into it. Sockeye salmon is the third most common Pacific salmon species, after pink and chum salmon. The name "sockeye" is an anglicization of suk-kegh (sθə́qəy̓), its name in Halkomelem, the language of the indigenous people along the lower reaches of the Fraser River (one of British Columbia's many native Coast Salish languages). Suk-kegh means red fish.
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Migration
Adapted to swimming
Egg layer
Predator
Semelparous
Spawning