Protecting and restoring wild salmon habitat is essential for population recovery and for the welfare of millions of individual fish that migrate through degraded rivers.
Wild salmon welfare is inextricably linked to the quality of their habitat. Salmon that must navigate past dams, through warm low-oxygen water, and over degraded spawning beds experience physiological stress, injury, and elevated mortality. When populations decline, the suffering of individual fish during migration is not often considered, but the evidence that fish are sentient and capable of pain makes the welfare dimension of habitat degradation significant. Conservation efforts that restore river connectivity, improve water quality, and reduce thermal stress directly improve the welfare of individual fish throughout their lifecycle. Wild salmon are also a window into the ecological health of whole watersheds — their decline signals systemic habitat degradation affecting many other species.