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Research article2020Peer reviewed

Recreational trolling effort and catch of Atlantic salmon and brown trout in Vanern, the EU's largest lake

Andersson, A.; Greenberg, L. A.; Bergman, E.; Su, Z.; Andersson, M.; Piccolo, J. J.

Abstract

Recreational fishing has grown substantially worldwide; for some recreational fisheries both catch and economic value now exceeds that of commercial fisheries. Monitoring of recreational fisheries effort and catch is therefore important for sustainable fisheries management. We developed and implemented an angler survey to estimate effort and catch for the recreational trolling fishery for landlocked Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) and brown trout (S. trutta) in Lake Vanern, Sweden. Major challenges were the large spatial scale and dispersed fishing effort, a lack of revenue from fishing licence sales, and a lack of catch reporting requirements. We developed a complemented roving/mail-in survey to estimate effort and catch during the main fishing periods, spring and fall, 2014. Instantaneous counts from major access sites were used for effort estimates, and mail-in surveys were used for catch rates. Our results show that Vanern supports a salmon and trout fishery of some 28.7 +/- 3.3 tonnes per year. Fishing effort was higher in the spring than in the fall, and there were seasonal differences in catch rates for trout but not for salmon. Estimates show that the recreational trolling fishery now harvests more salmon and trout annually than do the commercial and subsistence fisheries combined. This highlights the importance of continuing an angler survey program for Vanern as a key element for sustainable fisheries management, and can serve as a model for other recreational fisheries at large spatial scales.

Keywords

Angler survey; Atlantic salmon; Brown trout; Complemented survey; Lake vanern; Recreational fisheries

Published in

Fisheries Research
2020, Volume: 227, article number: 105548Publisher: ELSEVIER

    Sustainable Development Goals

    SDG12 Responsible consumption and production
    SDG14 Life below water

    UKÄ Subject classification

    Fish and Aquacultural Science

    Publication identifier

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fishres.2020.105548

    Permanent link to this page (URI)

    https://res.slu.se/id/publ/105346