Egg Survival Rates for Atlantic Salmon in the Romaine River

The Romaine hydroelectric complex is located on Québec’s Côte-Nord, Canada. The construction and the 30-year+ monitoring of the salmon population started in 2009. The results presented cover two years of study on fertilized egg survival rates in natural conditions.

The 800+ fertilized eggs were put in 72 capsules buried in artificial nests in two spawning grounds in the fall of 2010 and 2012. They were retrieved the next spring when egg development had reached >95%. The second year of survey, the capsules were fixed on 12 racks to avoid the digging up of capsules by female salmon building their nests.

The viable egg survival rate was statistically significantly different (p<0.05) between spawning grounds (31.1% and 6.3% in 2013), between locations in the spawning grounds (2.9% to 54.0% for 3 locations in the KM 46 spawning ground in 2013), between years (31.1% and 50.1% at the KM 46 spawning ground) and between capsules (0% to 100% in 2011 and 0% to 91.7% in 2013). No statistically-significant difference could be observed between females both years. The major factor explaining the difference between spawning grounds is the depth, the KM 34 spawning ground being atypical with an average depth greater than 3 m.