Trout & salmon · Freshwater
Pink salmon
Oncorhynchus gorbuscha
Anadromous Pacific salmon with an obligate two-year life cycle and rapid juvenile movement from gravel to estuary/ocean.
Also called Humpback salmon, pink, humpy, humpback.
- Flowing water
- Regulated context
- 4 of 4 overlays reviewed
- Reviewed 2026-08-27
Photograph · reviewed 2026-08-27
USFWS species-labeled 5184×3888 underwater photograph of pink salmon in the Dosewallips River. The leading fish shows adult head and body morphology in natural habitat; background fish are secondary context.
Roger Tabor / USFWS · U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service · Public Domain — U.S. federal government work Source
Before you target this fish
Regulated context — check the rules for the exact water
Where this applies Pacific coastal and Alaska jurisdictions with season, retention, gear, and run-specific rules.
The reviewed context, unedited
Regulated-context record. Returning freshwater adults are migration/spawning fish that stop feeding; verify current salmon rules and never convert redds or concentrations into target locations.
Rules for this fish change at a state line and sometimes inside one. Check the ones that apply to the exact water you are standing on before you act on anything here — this record is biology, not permission.
Take this somewhere
This page is the record. The reading is what happens when you add water, a season and a temperature to it — that is where the families below get ranked against each other instead of just listed.
Those three links carry the fish and nothing else. No conditions were declared on this page, so none travel, and the link says so rather than sending an empty reading.
The half nobody publishes
What this record does not know
Everything else on this page comes from a named agency or peer-reviewed source. This is the other side of that: the questions a reviewer went looking for an answer to and came back without, and the fields the record leaves empty because filling them would mean guessing.
It is here rather than at the bottom because a page that only shows what it knows is easy to read as a page that knows everything. For Pink salmon there are 10 of them.
Named by a reviewer
8Somebody looked for this and wrote down that they did not find it.
- Behaviour
Nobody has sourced:
- species-specific angling-pressure response beyond general cover/light notes
- cold-front / barometric response with primary-source support
- water-level rise/fall response with primary-source support
- Identification
Nobody has sourced:
- odd-year vs even-year mean size as a structured split
- Forage
Nobody has sourced:
- finer month-by-month diet inside a season, which is waterbody-specific
- crustacean fraction (no catalog forage class here)
- Season
Nobody has sourced:
- month-by-month location changes inside a season, which are waterbody-specific
- odd-year vs even-year run calendars as a structured overlay
Absent from the record
2No reviewer wrote a gap here. The field is simply empty, which is its own answer.
- Water temperature
No agency or peer-reviewed temperature band for Pink salmon was found that a review would accept. The reading runs without one rather than borrowing a number from a related fish.
- Population context
No regional population profile is registered. The species-level reading stands on its own; it does not silently become a local one.
Where the record puts it
Water and range
Flowing water
5 reviewed holding classes- Run
- Pool head
- Pool tail
- Current break
- Tributary mouth
DepthTypically mid-column to lower-column during river migration, varying with flow, channel form, and light.
Moving waterFreshwater adults are migratory river fish; velocity relief and travel lanes matter more than resident feeding stations.
LightLower light can alter migration depth and visibility but is not evidence that returning adults have resumed feeding.
Thermal band
Temperature
No reviewed temperature band
Nobody publishes a preferred or active temperature range for Pink salmon that a review would accept. Borrowing one from a related fish would look like knowledge and behave like a guess, so the reading runs without it and says which parts of the answer that weakens.
How it uses water
Behaviour
This catalog record is flowing water only. Freshwater adults are migratory river fish.
Alaska DFG: adults returning to spawn do not eat. Young migrating to the ocean may eat aquatic insects and zooplankton. Ocean diet is plankton, shrimp/krill, smaller fish, and squid. Freshwater presentation is interception/reaction only.
Catalog: lower light can alter migration depth and visibility but is not evidence that returning adults have resumed feeding.
Seasonal activityAlaska DFG: return between late June and mid-October after about 18 months at sea. NOAA: independent odd-year and even-year populations. Abundance must not be inferred from habitat. This record has no stillwater job.
Temperature-driven behaviourPreferred band roughly 44–58°F. Warm, low flow is a travel constraint, not a shallow feeding cue.
Depth movementTypically mid-column to lower-column during river migration, varying with flow, channel form, and light.
Facing the currentVelocity relief and travel lanes matter more than resident feeding stations (catalog).
Change in flowFlow pulses can move traveling adults. That is migration mechanics, not a named bottleneck.
CoverRuns, pool heads, pool tails, current breaks, and tributary mouths as travel classes. Redds are excluded.
Open waterOcean phase is pelagic. This freshwater record has no stillwater presentations.
Predator avoidanceDepth, turbidity, and grouping during travel.
Spawning (conservation context)NOAA: females construct redds; all pink salmon die after they spawn. Alaska DFG: a group of nests is a redd. Redds and concentrated spawning fish are excluded from target guidance. Odd/even year structure is not a targeting calendar.
Where the general rule stops
- ADF&G states that adults returning to freshwater stop eating; presentation output therefore describes interception/reaction mechanics only.
- The two-year life cycle creates strong odd/even-year population structure in many systems; abundance must not be inferred from habitat alone.
What it can eat
Forage
- Aquatic insects
- Zooplankton
- Small forage fish
Alaska DFG: adults returning to spawn do not eat. Young salmon migrating to the ocean may eat aquatic insects and zooplankton. NOAA: pink salmon feed on small crustaceans, zooplankton, squid, and small fish — crustaceans are not a catalog forage class here. Freshwater adult diet is interception/reaction, not forage matching.
- Feeding style
- Opportunistic
- Feeding zone
- Pelagic
Through the year
- Summer
- Returning freshwater adults do not eat (Alaska DFG). Ocean feeding is behind them. Odd/even year structure is not a diet event.
- Late summer
- Migration and ripening, not a forage-matching problem.
- Fall
- Spawning fish do not establish feeding lies. Diet guidance for freshwater adults stays conservation-first.
By life stage
- Young of year
- Alaska DFG: aquatic insects and zooplankton on the way to the ocean. They leave gravel quickly.
- Juvenile
- Short freshwater residence; ocean entry on plankton, shrimp/krill, and small fish.
- Adult
- Alaska DFG: adults returning to spawn do not eat. As with the pink freshwater record, presentation describes interception/reaction mechanics only.
Ontogenetic shiftBrief freshwater insect/zooplankton feeding, marine pelagic feeding, then feeding stops on the freshwater return.
SubstitutionsDo not substitute a trout hatch match, a Chinook piscivore diet, or a stillwater pelagic diet — this record is flowing-only and freshwater adults do not eat.
Diet capacity is not proof that a hatch or prey event is occurring. Observed current forage still comes from a user observation or Hatch Match.
Through the year
Season
Summer
- Where they sit
- Coastal river travel lanes — runs, pool heads, pool tails, current breaks, and tributary mouths as classes.
- Feeding
- Alaska DFG: adults returning to spawn do not eat. Ocean feeding is behind them.
- Temperature
- Preferred 44–58°F.
What that changesSwing, Cross-current retrieve, Downstream retrieve, and Pulse / jig remain the reviewed flowing families — they describe interception/reaction, not feeding lies.
What would count against it
- treating returning pinks as feeding trout
- adding stillwater families — this record has none
NOAA: odd-year and even-year populations are independent. Abundance must not be inferred from habitat.
Late summer
- Where they sit
- Continuing freshwater travel and holding in non-target migration water.
- Feeding
- Still not eating. Ripening, not forage matching.
What that changesSwing, Cross-current retrieve, Downstream retrieve, and Pulse / jig as interception mechanics only.
What would count against it
- converting presence into a hatch match
Fall
- Where they sit
- Spawning systems. Not a presentation-as-feeding problem.
What that changesReviewed flowing families remain interception only where harvest is lawful.
What would count against it
- naming spawning reaches or bottlenecks
- forcing a stillwater calendar
NOAA: all pink salmon die after they spawn. Redds and concentrated spawning fish are excluded from target guidance.
Spawning · Summer, Late summer, Fall
Spawns from summer into fall. Returning adults stop feeding in freshwater; redds and concentrated spawning fish are excluded from target guidance.
Recorded as conservation context. No spawning site, staging concentration or migration bottleneck is named anywhere in this catalog, because naming one is how a population gets fished out.
Telling it apart
Identification
What to look at
- Alaska DFG ocean-phase key: large oval spots on both lobes of the tail; large black spots on the back; no silver on the tail; very small scales compared with other salmon of similar size.
- Alaska DFG: mouth is white with a black gum line; very small or almost no teeth; no teeth on the tongue; pointed lower jaw.
- NOAA: large dark oval spots on the back and the entire tail fin. Males develop a hump on their back — the humpy name.
- Alaska DFG / NOAA: smallest Pacific salmon in North America, averaging 3.5–5 lb and 20–25 in.
- Two-year life cycle with independent odd-year and even-year populations (NOAA). That cycle is biology, not an abundance claim from habitat.
- Average adult length
- Alaska DFG / NOAA: 20–25 in (Alaska DFG fast facts also 18–25 in).
- Common angling size
- 18–25 in in coastal river fisheries where harvest is lawful.
- Typical weight
- Alaska DFG / NOAA: 3.5–5 lb (fast facts 3–5.5 lb).
- Maximum documented
- Occasional larger fish occur; they remain far below Chinook and typical chum size. Maxima are not a continent-wide catalog number.
- Longevity
- Alaska DFG: shortest Pacific salmon lifespan in North America; they mature and complete the entire life cycle in two years. NOAA: typically spawn at age 2.
What it gets confused with
- Chum salmon
- Chum have no dark spots on back or tail and show silver streaks along the tail-fin rays (Alaska DFG). Pink have large oval spots on both tail lobes, no silver on the tail, and very small scales. Chum are also much larger.
- Chinook salmon
- Chinook are the large blackmouth with spots on both tail lobes but ordinary salmon scales and a heavy body. Pink are small, oval-spotted, small-scaled, and lack silver on the tail.
- Coho salmon
- Coho have small spots on the upper tail lobe only and a white band at the tooth base. Pink spots are large ovals on the entire tail.
What follows from all of that
Presentation families
Flowing water
Swing
Let current carry a bait or fly across a lane so it broadens and lifts at the hang.
- downstream quartering
- controlled belly
- hang-down pause
- slow lift
What it asks of the tackle
- Depth control
- Moderate
- Sensitivity
- Moderate
- Casting distance
- Moderate
- Weight range
- Unweighted to 1/4 oz
- Cover resistance
- Low
- Line visibility
- Moderate
- Retie frequency
- Low
Cross-current retrieve
Represent mobile prey crossing or holding near a current boundary.
- horizontal travel
- intermittent pause
- depth retention
- controlled acceleration
What it asks of the tackle
- Depth control
- Moderate
- Sensitivity
- Moderate
- Casting distance
- Moderate
- Weight range
- 1/8–3/8 oz
- Cover resistance
- Moderate
- Line visibility
- Low
- Retie frequency
- Moderate
Downstream retrieve
Move a bait with the current, then add just enough speed to give it a swimming job.
- cast upstream
- recover slack
- match or slightly beat current
- pause in pockets
What it asks of the tackle
- Depth control
- Moderate
- Sensitivity
- Moderate
- Casting distance
- Moderate
- Weight range
- 1/16–3/8 oz
- Cover resistance
- Low
- Line visibility
- Low
- Retie frequency
- Moderate
Pulse / jig
Lift and drop a compact bait so it occupies a pocket, seam, or head without leaving the water column.
- short lift
- controlled drop
- stay in the pocket
- repeat on the same piece
What it asks of the tackle
- Depth control
- High
- Sensitivity
- High
- Casting distance
- Short to moderate
- Weight range
- 1/8–3/8 oz
- Cover resistance
- Moderate
- Line visibility
- Low
- Retie frequency
- High
What moves them for this fish
Reviewed rules that push particular families up when the conditions match. Each one names the conditions it needs and why it exists, so you can disagree with it.
ADF&G states returning pink salmon stop eating; the model therefore reinforces only reviewed current/interception jobs.
When
Flowing water · Run, Pool head, Pool tail, Current break
Moves up
Swing, Cross-current retrieve, Downstream retrieve, Pulse / jig
Reviewed 2026-08-27
Where every sentence came from
Sources
Agency
NOAA Fisheries Pink Salmon species profile
Used for behaviour; season. Read 2026-08-30, next check 2026-12-04.
Agency
Alaska Department of Fish and Game Pink Salmon species profile
Used for habitat, thermal band and presentation families. Read 2026-08-27, next check 2026-11-27.
Agency
Used for identification. Read 2026-08-30, next check 2026-11-21.
Agency
Used for identification. Read 2026-08-30, next check 2026-11-21.
Agency
Used for behaviour. Read 2026-08-30, next check 2026-12-04.
Agency
Used for forage. Read 2026-08-30, next check 2026-11-19.
Agency
NOAA Fisheries Pink Salmon species profile (zooplankton, small crustaceans, small fish)
Used for forage. Read 2026-08-30, next check 2026-11-19.
Agency
Alaska Department of Fish and Game Pink Salmon species profile
Used for season. Read 2026-08-30, next check 2026-12-05.
A source with no link predates the rule that one has to carry a URL. It is still a real citation and still checkable; it just takes a search rather than a click, and that is worth knowing before you rely on it.