SLU and the Swedish Anglers' Association in new collaboration - the Big Fish Register becomes a research resource

– We are very pleased that we now have access to the Big Fish Register. The register contains a lot of important and exciting information that will help us investigate how different fish stocks are doing, but also gain a better understanding of how stocks develop over time, says Göran Sundblad, a researcher at the Department of Aquatic Resources (SLU Aqua).

– The collaboration also gives us an opportunity to analyze data on the largest fish, which are often missed in traditional monitoring methods. These individuals are often the most sensitive to changes and can give us important information about the health of ecosystems, Göran continues.

The idea is also that the collaboration will raise public awareness of the Big Fish Register and encourage more anglers to contribute their catches, which in turn could provide even more valuable data for research.

– One of the basic ideas behind the Big Fish Register has been to document developments in fish stocks and sport fishing. The new collaboration with SLU means that the data can be used more systematically. All the thousands of anglers who have reported catches over the years can now feel proud that their data contributes to increasing knowledge about Swedish fish stocks, says Joel Norlin from the Swedish Anglers' Association.

No information on where different fish were caught, other than that already visible on the Anglers' website, is used in the researchers' analysis. Secret fishing locations are therefore not at risk of being revealed.