Preparing For Adulthood
When the salmon are ready to enter the sea, they become smolts (as indicated by the par marks), migrate to the estuaries and can spend weeks or months letting their bodies adjust to salt water and feeding in the rich habitats estuaries provide. Once they've grown accustomed to salt water and have become large enough, they move into the nearshore marine areas, which provide vital food sources and protection (eelgrass) from predators critical to juvenile salmon survival.
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