The welfare of salmon in hatcheries - where they spend the first year of life - shapes their health and resilience throughout production. Hatchery welfare is an underappreciated determinant of lifetime welfare outcomes.
Hatchery welfare is the foundation of lifetime salmon welfare - early life experience shapes physiological stress responses, immune competence and behavioural patterns that persist into adulthood. A salmon stressed in the hatchery is likely to be a less resilient adult in sea cages. Despite this, hatchery welfare standards are less developed than sea cage standards, and the dense populations of tiny fish in intensive hatchery systems are difficult to monitor for welfare. The industry focus on hatchery performance (survival rate, growth) does not translate automatically into welfare improvement - a salmon can grow well while experiencing chronic stress. Developing welfare-specific hatchery assessment protocols is a research priority.