Hooked on catch reporting

Garry Smith has been fishing all around Queensland for as long as he can remember.

A hobby that kept him out of trouble in his early years, and a way to unwind from high-stress jobs in his adulthood, recreational fishing is an integral part of his life.

Host of the long-running FishTalk segment on ABC Far North, and based in Cairns, he gets out to fish around 100 times a year, with a recent highlight of his fishing career being a personal best, a 94cm golden snapper caught while drift fishing.

“These days, I love to fish off the rock headlands north of Cairns, when there’s calm weather for good fishing”, he says.

A self-described ‘fishing-obsessive’, Garry has been documenting his catches using the Qld Fishing 2.0 app’s ‘My fishing’ feature since its launch in 2024, and has found that the additional features of the app have helped him learn more about his fishing habits.

“Being part of the working group for the development of the app helped me understand the reasons why Fisheries Queensland wanted to gain more data from fishers, as well as how it could help me manage the data I was already collecting for myself.

“I was already keeping a log of my trips for about 10 years on calendars, just what fish I caught and where, but the app has allowed me to record them in even greater detail. I can add in weather conditions, time of day, depredation and other information, which means I can see any patterns in my successful and unsuccessful fishing trips.”

When he’s out fishing, Garry says that the information available offline about catch limits, closed seasons, and bag limits helps him stay up to date with the latest fishing regulations.

Garry wants to see more species added to the app and more local names for fish included in species details, to make it easier for fishers to find what they need, even if they don’t know the formal title.

“There’s a whole range of regional species names across Queensland, so it would be great to have more of those included in the species names, and to be searchable within the app.

“For example, you might be fishing in Innisfail and catch what you know as a ‘big scale’, or if you’re in Ingham, it’s a ‘chopper’, but it’s officially called a golden snapper.”

He says that recording fishing trips through the app addresses a long-standing gap in fish stock data collection, as fishers who cast off from the coastline or freshwater banks can help contribute, even if they aren’t surveyed at a boat ramp.

“We need legitimate, good data to get a strong picture of the health of our waterways. Previously, there were no researchers or surveyors on the headlands where I like to fish, which means that any fishers up there aren’t being surveyed, and there is less information about fish stocks in those areas. Having recreational fishers log their trips themselves would help fill in the blanks.

“The fact that location data is logged in a 30 x 30 nautical mile grid makes me feel reassured that my good fishing spots won’t be found out.”

A note from Fisheries Queensland

Did you know? The Qld Fishing 2.0 app already includes alternative names for each species in the ‘Details’ tab, including many local names.

We’re adding more names all the time, and Garry’s feedback has helped us expand the list even further.

The best part is that the app’s search tool checks both official and other species names, so you can easily find what you’re looking for anywhere in Queensland.

Got a name we’ve missed? Email us at qldrecreationalfishingapp.support@dpi.qld.gov.au, and we’ll add it in!