Swedish fishing sites fail to share best practices for catch-and-release
A review of 331 recreational fishing organizations in Sweden found that most fail to provide anglers with scientifically-backed guidance on catch-and-release techniques—a gap that undermines the sustainability benefits these programs promise. The finding reveals a disconnect between fisheries management policy and the information actually reaching anglers who could improve outcomes.
Originaltitel: Informing obligations: Best practice information for catch‐and‐release in Swedish local recreational fisheries management
<p>Catch-and-release (C&R) is a popular management tool that can support sustainable development of recreational fisheries, if anglers adopt scientifically informed “best practices.” However, although the role of best practices is widely established in the academic literature, this knowledge is not always disseminated to anglers. In this paper, we investigated if and to what extent local management organizations provided best practice information to anglers. Based on a sample of 331 Swedish organizations, we reviewed the websites through which these organizations sold fishing licenses. Our review demonstrated widespread use of C&R as a management tool yet a general lack of best practice information. Among the small fraction of organizations that mentioned best practices, most mentioned only a single practice, with little consistency among practices that received attention. In addition, best practice information was particularly lacking for pike (Esox Lucius) and perch (Perca fluviatilis), which are by far the most landed and released species nationally. We discovered major knowledge deficiencies that provide insights about where and how to focus efforts for improving best practice information, in the context of local recreational fisheries management.</p>