Fisheries and Marine Officers recreational fishing survey: 1998/99 – 2009/10

Throughout Western Australia Fisheries and Marine Officers (FMOs) play a vital role in ensuring the sustainability of fish resources. Since July 1998, in the course of their other compliance activities, FMOs have collected information from recreational fishers on their catch and fishing trip. The primary objective of this report was to summarise the data collected by FMOs and ascertain the effectiveness of the convenience (i.e. unstructured) sampling technique for determining trends in recreational fishing patterns throughout Western Australia. Recreational fishing data was collected by FMOs during 6 629 land-based and boat-based patrols completed between 1998/99 – 2009/10, mostly within the West Coast bioregion