Enough Yukon River chinook salmon have crossed into the territory below Dawson City to meet spawning goals and provide for an aboriginal food fishery.

The target to achieve an adequate number of spawning chinook in the Yukon ranges from a minimum of 42,500 to 55,000.

The sonar at Eagle, Alaska, near the border, put the run at 57,980 as of midnight.

Under the management strategy for this year, the Yukon Salmon Sub-Committee recommended to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans that no aboriginal food fishery be permitted until the count at Eagle hit 48,750, the mid-point of the spawning target.

Sub-Committee chair Pauline Frost explained this morning the committee recommended late last week that an aboriginal food fishery be permitted.

Frost said four First Nations have asked Fisheries and Oceans for a conservative allocation while others are continuing with a voluntary closure.

The numbers say there is room for a small harvest, Frost said.

Resource manager Mary-Ellen Jarvis of Fisheries and Oceans said today while opportunities are open for the aboriginal food fishery, First Nations have been asked to take just 10 per cent of what they would normally take.

Four First Nations have indicated they’ll have a limited fishery while others have indicated they will not go fishing, she said.

Jarvis said at this point, there is no provision for a commercial or sport fishery.

While the run has passed the upper end of the spawning target, the Yukon is still bound by an international agreement to manage its harvest within certain parameters, Jarvis explained.

“I guess the bottom line is there is a small allocation to First Nations when you consider the international harvest agreement,” she said.

“And the First Nations are working with us in order to meet that obligation under the international agreement.”

Salmon scientist Stephanie Schmidt of the Alaska Department of Fish and Game said today she expects the final count past the Eagle sonar will end up somewhere between 65,000 and 70,000 chinook.

The run is also looking more normal and better than last year’s in terms of the female to male ratio, with an estimated 44 per cent female and 56 per cent male, compared to far fewer females last year, she said.

Schmidt said the chinook are also larger this year but they were expecting that because they were anticipating the run to be dominated by the older six-year age class.

Alaska again implemented strict closures for the subsistence fishery this year to help meet its treaty obligation of ensuring at least 42,500 chinook of Yukon origin reached the border.

Tight restrictions on both sides of the border last year resulted in the lowest aboriginal food fishery on record in the Yukon and the lowest subsistence fishery in Alaska on record.

The Yukon River chinook salmon stock has been in trouble for several years now, and nobody is quite sure why.

This year, salmon managers on both sides of the border were forecasting a total chinook run of between 118,000 and 140,000.

In years gone by, the total harvest would easily exceed 140,000.

Schmidt said they’ve already passed the low range of the preseason forecast as the run of chinook is all but over near the mouth of the river.

Alaska did allow for a short commercial harvest at the tail end of the run when most chinook of Yukon origin had gone by, as well as a short, restricted subsistence harvest.

Some Yukon First Nations have called for a full closure on chinook salmon for an entire life cycle of seven or eight years to enable the stocks to rebound.