In 1918 a graduate student named Masamitsu Oshima traveled to the then-Japanese colony
of Taiwan with the goal of drawing a detailed map of its freshwater fish population. There,
he came across an interesting red-spotted salmon specimen that his colleague Takeo
Aoki had collected out of a stream high up in the Taiwanese mountains near Taichung.
It reminded him of the trout that he saw back home in Japan, but not quite.
Oshima told his doctoral advisor Dr. David Starr Jordan — ichthyologist,
first Stanford Chancellor and infamous eugenicist — about this new specimen
and in November 1919 they announced the discovery of a new species of salmon:
The Formosan Landlocked Salmon. It is one of Taiwan’s rarest fish.
I have a deep passion for fish.
Come to the Asianometry YouTube for analysis on TSMC and national semiconductor politics.
Stay for the conservation efforts of a foot long mountain salmon.
The salmon's Chinese name is 櫻花鉤吻鮭 (Yīnghuā gōu wěn guī), which literally means cherry hook-kiss
mouth-salmon. It is a cold water fish about 30 centimeters long. It can be considered a sister
subspecies to the Japanese salmon and can be said to be the southernmost natural salmon population.
Its body is dark turquoise or green with a silver-white colored belly. It has 8-12 dark
bands on its side (called parr marks in the fish world). Along its back,
11 to 31 black spots. It has a wide, hooked mouth.
The salmon is a cold water fish and can survive only in temperatures below 16 degrees Celsius.
Most of the time Taiwan is quite warm. A river with water so cold is extremely rare
and makes it unlikely that the salmon should have a home here. Thus, it can only survive
in streams and tributaries high up in the mountains over 1,500 meters above sea level.
How the salmon made its way up to these mountains remains fiercely debated.
Some 10-80 million years ago the salmon’s ancestors migrated from the Sea of Japan
up Taiwan’s rivers. But when the glaciers retreated at the end of the Ice Age,
those salmon found themselves trapped on the top of the mountains.
Salmon have a migratory nature. They spawn and are born in the rivers. Then they travel to the sea,
where they feed and grow to adulthood. Soon thereafter,
they migrate back to the rivers where they were born so that they may breed and lay eggs.
The Formosan Landlocked Salmon has no access to the sea, as the water in the Tachia river's lower
reaches was too warm for the fish to survive in. So how can the salmon continue to survive?
Dr. Oshima theorized that the salmon would trace its way up and down the river - something that
the river's long, relatively flat upper reaches allowed. The Tachia River's upper river basin
gave the fish a unique sanctuary to survive tens of thousands of years.
As late as 1949, the salmon was widely distributed in streams high up in the mountains of Taiwan.
An observational report in the early 1950s found plenty of fish:
> The stream water was very clean. I could see lots of fish everywhere. Catching a Salmon was
easy because at that time only few people lived or visited there and trees were flourishing
along both sides of the stream. The natural environment was not yet destroyed then ...
But throughout the 50s, 60s, and 70s, their range shrunk to a single 7km section
on the Chichiawan Stream in the upper reaches of the Tachia river.
Part of the reason for this decline had to do with the further development
of Taiwan’s areas. New highways and settlements in the upper Tachia river basin had increased
the population from 500 scattered indigenous to 55,000 Waishengren and other settlers.
New methods of fishing the salmon population had devastating effect on the population.
Using poison, dynamite, and electricity, the fish rapidly declined in numbers.
Furthermore, a number of dams built along Taiwan’s rivers isolated and shrank the population.
The most significant of these dams was the Techi Dam, Taiwan's tallest. Completed in 1974,
the dam is over 778 feet high and stands as one of Taiwan's proudest engineering achievements.
The dam is indeed a beautiful sight and is worth a visit to the Heping District in Taichung.
But it and the silt-trapping dams built alongside the river's reaches also presented a significant
threat to the salmon by vastly limiting its habitat. Combined with illegal logging
activities and deforestation, the salmon has lost a significant amount of what was once its home.
Along with the Formosan Sika deer and the Mikado pheasant, the Formosan land-locked salmon has
become a symbol of the island’s natural endemic animal populations. It is featured prominently
on the 2000 NTD bill (which I admit is not all that common) along with those animals.
Considering that many such endemic species on islands like New Zealand
are usually wiped out with human settlement,
that a few Taiwanese animals like the salmon and its ilk have survived is pretty amazing.
Taiwan has already lost the Formosan clouded leopard. The salmon deserves to keep surviving.
The fish's special traits have been recognized since antiquity.
The aboriginal tribes living in the mountains have fished it for over four
thousand years. They believed that the fish was a gift from their ancestors.
In 1938, the Japanese colonial government in Taiwan declared the Formosan Salmon
a national treasure. It prohibited illegal logging
and imposed a fishing moratorium on the species during its breeding season.
These protections lapsed once the Republic of China took over from the Japanese after World War
II. The ROC pursued economic development and the salmon's habitat deteriorated for many years.
It was not until 1976 when biologists began to raise the alarm about the fish's decline.
In 1984, the Taiwan government declared the salmon an endangered species and committed to preserve
it. A series of publicity events promoted the salmon's importance as part of nature.
On TV and national papers, the salmon would be referred to as a "national treasured fish"
and a symbol of Taiwan's identity. 140,000 tourists visited the Wuling area each year,
taking in the natural scenery and learning about the fish.
The government worked hard with various stakeholders, including the settlers and
indigenous tribes living in the area. Local farmers started a "salmon patrol"
to watch out for illegal fishing. And then in 1993,
the Shei-Pa National Park was established to protect the fish's entire habitat.
The population rebounded for a little bit but then has declined from the peak of 2,000 in 1987. A
combination of human activities and natural disasters have contributed to this decline.
Soon, a debate emerged between the local residents living in agricultural farms near the river
and conservationists. The farmers have been there for decades or even longer. But their logging and
farming activities disturbed the fish's home. And the fish can't be moved from the river.
Removing the silt trapping dams along the Tachia river would also contribute
to the fish's future but in the end it became clear that doing
so would certainly cause future damage to the valuable Tachia dam downstream.
Eventually in 2000, five pairs of wild salmon were collected and
placed into captive breeding programs. 5,000 individuals were bred through the aqua-farm
while the scientific community debated their release. The question was made moot
when in 2004 Typhoon Ariel smashed the farm and released a bunch of them.
The result is an increase in the population that continues to this day, but also a corresponding
decline in genetic diversity. Scientists continue to study this effect and its long term effects.
The Formosan Landlocked Salmon is a weird creature.
It is nothing like the majestic salmon that we see in the ocean. It's rather small and demur.
Your first reaction is that it should be more of a trout than a real salmon.
But there is something about this fish that just really compels me. I just wrote 1,400
words about it! Maybe it has something to do with the microcosm that is Taiwan island. In one part
of the island you got high-tech skyscrapers and some of the world's most sophisticated technology
companies. Just a few hundred miles away, you have dense mountain wilderness and this little fish.
Or maybe it has something to do with its circumstances — being trapped in a single
mountain stream nearly two kilometers above sea level, cut off from the rest of the world.
A metaphor for Taiwan itself.