Geog 360:  Watershed Science and Policy, Spring 2001, University of Oregon
Class 8 Lecture Outline and Assignments
[http://geography.uoregon.edu/mcdowell/geog360/2001/geog360navbar.htm]
Wednesday, April 25th:  Fish Life Cycles and Habitat Needs
Physical, biological, & chemical factors  Fish Distribution within Temperate Streams, Pages 389-400 in Moyle and Cech. 2000. This reading is in the course packet, and the book is on reserve in Knight Library.
General habitat characteristics  Habitat Structure, Cover, Complexity, and Productivity, Pages 279-290 in Matthews. 1998. This in reading packet 2, and the book is on reserve in Knight Library.
Salmon & habitat Pages 26-47 in Field Guide to the Pacific Salmon, Adopt-a-Stream Foundation. This book is on reserved in the library. It was available through the bookstore.
Oregon's salmon Pages 1-10 in Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife (ODFW) paper on Oregon's coastal salmon and their habitat requirements:
http://www.dfw.state.or.us/ODFWhtml/InfoCntrFish/PDFs/BKG_Coastal.pdf 
Some Additional Light Reading For a very enjoyable read on the issues discussed in class today, check out David Carroll's vignette on turtles and brook trout in a New England stream during the winter. The story, found in the latest issue of Wild Earth (Spring 2001), is entitled "Deadfalls, Turtles, and Trout." Wild Earth is in Knight library periodicals section, shelved under QH 75 .A1.
Reading guide:  

Fish Distribution within Temperate Streams, p. 389-400.

1.  What are key habitat elements important to fish? 

  • What are the differences between warmwater and coldwater fisheries? 

  • What are other important water chemistry considerations for fish?

  • What role does turbidity play?

2.  What is zonation? How are certain types of resident fishes distributed longitudinally? 

  • What role does stream gradient play?

  • How do the relative abundances of the different fishes shift?

  • How does this concept relate to the River Continuum Concept? How is it different?

Habitat Structure, Cover, Complexity, and Productivity, p. 279-290.

3. What types of habitat structure are important for fish?

  • What role does substrate play?

  • What role does wood play? 

Field Guide to Pacific Salmon, p. 26-47

4. What aspects of water quality are important for salmon at different times in their life cycle?

  • How do changes in temperature affect salmon?

  • What chemical qualities of water are salmon sensitive to?

5. How do salmon reproduce? 

6. What are important structural components for salmon survival in streams?

Oregon's coastal salmon and their habitat requirements, p. 1-9.

5.  How do salmonids differ from one another? 

  • What are the different species of salmon found in Oregon (and the northern Pacific Ocean in general)?

  • What is a run/stock? 

  • How do the distribution and freshwater requirements of the species differ?

  • Know the different forms of migratory behavior: non-migratory, fluvial, adfluvial, and anadromy.
Question to Consider after You've Finished Reading:

Now that we have talked about and you have read about the importance of big wood in streams, what are the implications for having this important structural element in streams and rivers with regard to landowners? How might wood and structural complexity increase flood risk? How do we go about addressing the process of wood delivery to streams?
Lecture Guide:
I. Abiotic factors
   A. Gradient
        1. current and flow
        2. headwater, transitional (transfer), and depositional zones

   B. Temperature
        1. warmwater fisheries/fishes (temperatures >79 degrees F)
        2. coldwater fishes (temperatures < 79 degrees F)

   C. Water chemistry
        1. pH
        2. dissolved oxygen
      
 II. Life Cycles and Life History strategiees
   A. Generalized life cycle  - egg, juvenile, adult, spawner 

   B. Reproductive strategies
        1. livebearer, broadcast spawner, attacher, or nest-builder
             a. access to spawning areas (e.g. slackwater darter and floods)
             b. role of substrate size or type of substrate
        2. fecundity 
        3. age at reproductive maturation
        4. parental investment
        5. number of times a fish spawns (iteroparity vs. semelparity)
  
    C. Trophic feeding guilds
        1. piscivore
        2. invertivore - bottom, column, surface
        3. herbivore/detritivore
        4. parasite

   D. Types of Migration
        1. Freshwater-Ocean - anadromy vs. catadromy
        2. Resident freshwater - fluvial vs. adfluvial

III. Salmon life cycle

   A. 7 salmonid (Family Salmonidae) species in PNW (four commonly referred to as salmon and three
         trouts)

   B. Distribution of species across PNW - not all 7 species in all watersheds
  
   C. Diversity of life history strategies across species and within individual species
        1. differences in migrations: Kokanee vs. sockeye; steelhead vs. rainbow trout
        2. differences in where and when spawning occurs (i.e. headwaters vs. estuaries)

   D. Habitats
        1. spawning gravels and holding pools for waiting spawners
        2. lateral habitats - side channels and other areas as refuge from floods and high flows
        3. rearing habitats - pools, undercut banks
        4. estuaries - physiological transition for entrance to ocean

 
Key terms to know - You should be able to define each of these concepts and explain its importance.
life cycle
life history strategy
reproductive guilds (groups)
spawning
live-bearers
attacher
nest-builder
 broadcast spawner
fecundity
parental care
iteroparity
semelparity
resident
anadromy
 catadromy
fluvial
adfluvial
cover
lateral habitat
pulse disturbance
press disturbance
Habitat Gallery:  
Photos of stream habitats that illustrate some of the points made in today's lecture and in last Wednesday's (4/18) lecture.  
[http://geography.uoregon.edu/mcdowell/geog360/2001/geog360navbar.htm]

last update:  02/12/07 10:45 PM
Department of Geography, University of Oregon, Eugene OR, 97403-1251