UW Releases Revised Quinn Book on Pacific Salmon and Trout

A revised edition of University of Washington fisheries professor Thomas Quinn’s book “The Behavior and Ecology of Pacific Salmon and Trout” has been published, complete with over 100 new photos and information gained since the first edition in 2005.

“This is a book really about the fish, not about what we have done to them,” said Quinn, whose initial intent was to write “a book specifically about the fish, their behavior, their ecology, their movement, what they eat, what eats them.”

Over the past 13 years since the first edition was published, there has been substantial research on salmon and trout, and Quinn decided it was time for an updated version of the book.

The first edition was mostly about salmon. The revised and updated book covers all aspects of the life cycle of Pacific salmon, trout and char fish in the Pacific with chapters about: homing migration from the open ocean through coastal waters and up rivers to their breeding grounds; courtship and reproduction; the lives of juvenile salmon and trout in rivers and lakes; migration to the sea; the structure of fish populations; and the importance of fish carcasses to the ecosystem. The book also includes information on salmon and trout transplanted outside their ranges.

Almost all the photos in the original book were from slides. The new edition contains several digital images, tables, figures and updated references.

“It’s everything you ever wanted to know about salmon and trout, with beautiful photos, for students, anglers, conservation groups, citizens who want to get involved in stream restoration,” he said.

There is also information throughout the book on the impact of climate change on these fish, with the topic specifically addressed in the last chapter.

What’s important to me is that people realize it is an effort to be informative; to be accurate, but accessible and also visually attractive, so people can pick it up and read it,” he said.

“The last edition came out in 2005. There have been a fair number of things we have learned since then,” he said. That new research includes much on the impact of climate change on fish, which he has been monitoring. “We had an inkling, but things have happened faster than I would have guessed,” he said.

The book may be preordered from the University of Washington press, the nonprofit book and multimedia publishing arm of the university, at
https://www.washington.edu/uwpress/search/books/QUIBE2.html.