Salmon returning to spawn upriver.?

Question

I was always told that salmon do not eat on their way up river to spawn, that they will only strike a lure out of aggression. I wondered why do fishermen use something called a sardine wrap on some lures to entice a bite. They also use roe and catch salmon. I was then told that salmon go for the roe for the juices the roe contained,because they are hungry but can't eat because their throats have become too small to swallow any of their regular sized food once they start upriver. Any body know anything about this?

Answer 1

Actually what happens is they hit the lures because they think they are predators trying to steal the eggs for food. The sardine wrap even helps the trick by adding the smell of a real fish to the fake lure. The reason roe works is because a salmon will pick up a ball of eggs and place them back in the nest when the moving water begins to wash them away. They are not eating the eggs, just placing them back in the nest. No they dont eat while spawning.

Answer 2

I think that they bite on small flies, roe and other tidbits out of habit. They always seem so full of their own roe when spawning that there is no space inside of them at all. They must hit the larger lures just out of an attempt to clear them out of the spawning area. Many of the salmon I saw getting caught in the rivers were hooked outside of the mouth, I think they just happened to run into the fish line and were not actually biting at all.

Answer 3

I have heard that salmon will take stray roe with them not so much to eat it but to bring it to their spawning site. Trouts will do that too.