Yukon coho are running far below normal, and even a strong chum year likely won't reopen fishing

Silver salmon, or coho, returning to the Yukon River are coming in far below normal just as their peak arrival should be getting underway, the state says, the latest weak return on a river where subsistence fishing has been curtailed for years.

Fish and Game reported this week that coho passage is well below average and the run appears to be arriving later than usual. Coho typically enter the river in mid-August, and the bulk should be moving through the lower river now. The department expects this year's run to fall well short of its recent average.

Fall chum, by contrast, are running strong, above their typical levels and near the top of the healthy range for the river as a whole. But that likely will not be enough to reopen subsistence fishing for them. The reason is a treaty obligation to Canada: a share of the chum passing through Alaska is bound for spawning grounds across the border, and the U.S. has to let enough of them through. The department says passage would have to run even higher than it is now to meet that obligation, so a strong overall run still is not enough, and directed subsistence fishing for fall chum on the main Yukon is highly unlikely this season.

For the people who fish the river, that means the closures largely stand. Subsistence fishing for king, chum and coho is shut across more than thirty communities from the coast up through the middle river, with fish that are caught required to be released alive. A few narrow exceptions remain for non-salmon fishing and in two stretches upriver.

Federal managers have matched the state's restrictions in waters next to federal land. The account here comes from the department's updates, in which no fisherman, tribal government or fishery commission is quoted.

Amid the shortfalls, one number is better than in recent years: the Chinook, or king, count at the Eagle sonar near the Canadian border, while still below its long-term average, is the strongest it has been since 2020.