King and chum salmon are still slowly building a run up the Yukon this summer — and fishermen are contending with everything from gear restrictions to wildland fires in their efforts to fill their racks.

During the weekly teleconference with fishermen and managers from the state and federal level in U.S. and Canada — organized by the nonprofit Yukon River Drainage Fisheries Association — fisherman all along the river say Alaska’s intense fire season is definitely hampering their season, turning an afternoon boating on the river into a day choking in a smoke-filled oven.

Norma in Marshall said the local “firefighters are still out at the Card Street Fire (near the Kenai Peninsula community of Sterling), so a lot of our subsistence activities were lower than in previous weeks.”

Fred Huntington in Galena said “lots of forest fires” were likewise impacting fishing in his community.

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