A new study on steelhead trout in Oregon finds that wild and hatchery fish are different at the DNA level, and that they can become different with surprising speed.
The research, published Wednesday in Nature Communications, found that after one generation of hatchery culture, the offspring of wild fish and first-generation hatchery fish differed in the activity of more than 700 genes.
This research was conducted at Oregon State University in collaboration with the Oregon Department of Fisheries and Wildlife. Scientists say the findings essentially close the case on whether or not wild and hatchery fish can be genetically different.
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