Head and Mouth
The head on the salmon is almost elongated and comes forward into a mouth that appears beak-like. On the end of the mouth is a prominent hook on both the upper and lower jaw. This hook turns downward from the upper jaw and upward from the lower jaw. The characteristic makes this fish hard to mistake.
Coloration
The most prevalent colors are the pink and red combinations. The species tend to have a tinge of pink on their skin. The Chinook, or king, salmon has a light hue of pink on the lower half of its body.The upper part is silver blue, speckled with flecks of black.The coho, otherwise know as silver, has a deep red coloration running along its side. The chum, or dog salmon, also goes by the name Keta salmon. The coloration on this is almost striped from dark to light grey green and has a distinctive red under belly. The humpback salmon, which earned its name because of the hump on its back, is known as the pink salmon. Coloration on the skin is silver and with a very slight pink hue. The sockeye salmon, also known as reds, has the darkest coloration both on the skin and the flesh.
The Fins
Salmon are very streamlined: They have eight fins, including the tail fin. They have a dorsal fin on the ridge of their back. Directly behind that they have what is called an adipose fin. On the belly, they have an anal fin, two pelvic fins and two pectoral fins. These fins are found on all species of the salmon.
