Secondary males, either subdominant adults or, more usually, parr which mature in freshwater, are known to successfully fertilise Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) ova. This study has estimated the reproductive success of such secondary males in redds formed by pairs of wild and sea-ranched adults. Eight wild and 11 ranched redds were sampled from the Burrishoole system, western Ireland, in two consecutive years. Representative samples of fertilised ova were screened at three minisatellite loci to reconstruct the genotypes of putative anadromous parents and to estimate the proportion of eggs fertilised by secondary males. Multiple paternal genotypes were detected in 18 of the 19 samples, and of the 1484 progeny examined, 593 could not have been derived from the primary adult male genotype. The level of secondary male contribution detected among wild redds from Burrishoole (mean 28.9%) was similar to that found in previous published studies. The level among ranched redds was significantly higher (mean 48.2%) (P = 0.042). The difference was greater when data from 1995 were considered alone, with the average level of secondary male contribution in ranched redds being almost twice that in wild redds. Minimum numbers of secondary males were not significantly different between wild (mean 2.6) and ranched (mean 2.7) redds.
