Do marine fish hatcheries increase the number of fish for fishermen?
A. For decades salmon hatcheries have been producing fish which contribute to ocean and river salmon populations. California has nine hatcheries that collect eggs from returning adult salmon. The eggs are fertilized, incubated, and the juvenile fish released to the wild. The only marine hatchery now in production is in northern San Diego County. It is producing annually about 100,000 juvenile white seabass at this time, and will eventually produce about 400,000 per year. Each of the white seabass are tagged in order to determine the hatchery contribution to the ocean seabass population.
