Keta salmon

Open encyclopedia reference

The chum salmon (Oncorhynchus keta), also known as dog salmon or keta salmon, is a species of anadromous salmonid fish from the genus Oncorhynchus (Pacific salmon) native to the coastal rivers of the North Pacific and the Beringian Arctic. The English name "chum salmon" comes from the Chinook Jargon term tsəm, meaning "spotted" or "marked"; while keta in the scientific name comes from Russian, which in turn comes from the Evenki language of Eastern Siberia.

In Japan, chum salmon is also known as the white salmon (白鮭 シロサケ, shiro sake), autumn salmon (秋鮭 アキサケ, aki sake) or simply "the salmon" (鮭 サケ, sa ke), while historically it was known in kun'yomi as "stone katsura fish" (石桂魚 さけ, sa ke) up until the Meiji period. In Greater China, it is known academically as the "hook-snout salmon" (Chinese: 钩吻鲑), but is more often called the damaha fish (simplified Chinese: 大马哈鱼; traditional Chinese: 大麻哈魚), which is borrowed from dawa ịmaχa, the Nanai name of the fish used by the Hezhe minority in northern Northeast China.

Wikipedia contributors, Chum salmon; see linked history · CC BY-SA 4.0 . Plain-text lead excerpt, at most 180 words; no infobox or later sections Retrieved 2026-10-05T02:54:22.109466+00:00. This reference remains separate from the taxonomic record.

Identity & source status

Scientific name

Oncorhynchus keta (Walbaum, 1792)

Name authority

(Walbaum, 1792)

Common name

Keta salmon

Rank

species

Accepted status

accepted

Kingdom

Animalia

Phylum

Chordata

Class

Teleostei

Order

Salmoniformes

Family

Salmonidae

Genus

Oncorhynchus

Extinction status

Not supplied by this source

Source habitat flags: Marine: yes · Freshwater: yes · Terrestrial: no. These do not form a complete habitat description.

Classification family tree

Nested taxonomic groups from the source. This is not a direct-ancestor chain, a dated evolutionary tree or a phylogenetic reconstruction.

1. domainEukaryota (Chatton, 1925) Whittaker & Margulis, 1978
2. kingdomAnimalia
3. phylumChordata
4. subphylumVertebrata
5. infraphylumGnathostomata
6. parvphylumOsteichthyes
7. gigaclassActinopterygii
8. superclassActinopteri
9. classTeleostei
10. orderSalmoniformes
11. familySalmonidae Cuvier, 1816
12. subfamilySalmoninae Cuvier, 1816
13. genusOncorhynchus Suckley, 1861
14. speciesOncorhynchus keta (Walbaum, 1792)

Close classified relatives

These entries share the source’s genus, Oncorhynchus. They are not necessarily the closest relatives established by molecular evidence.

Browse 141 records assigned to Salmonidae.

Names & synonyms

Names explicitly linked to this accepted taxon in the source. Synonymy can change with revision.

Source literature & publication evidence

References attached to this source record, including nomenclatural citations where supplied. This is a selected bibliography; abbreviated citations remain in the source’s form.

1. https://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=127183 Source fields: Taxon.tsv dwc:namePublishedIn, Taxon.tsv dcterms:references

Origins, evidence & remaining research

Name authority and publication references document nomenclature where the source supplies it. They do not establish evolutionary origins or the earliest fossil occurrence.

Specimen-level evidence, morphology, ecological research, phylogenetic studies, a comprehensive bibliography and a located literary passage have not yet been compiled for this record. A suitable sourced image remains to be added.

Dataset citation & attribution

This exact taxon in ChecklistBank · Catalogue of Life 2026-09-11

Catalogue of Life 2026-09-11; dataset 316321; doi:10.48580/dgz5n. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ . Retrieved 5 October 2026.

Stable key: col:49JF6. Classification follows source parent identifiers. English common names may vary by region.