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Comments on the Data Sheet This sheet is designed specifically to be filled in as a separate sheet for each boat (obviously it does not matter whether it is filled in by the skipper, a deckhand or regular angler). The reason for this is to help standardise our measures of effort. Fishing techniques and the skills of skippers tend to remain relatively constant within a boat. It is much more informative, as a result, to compare catches of the same boat from day-to-day or season-to-season than to compare different boats. It is also, in our experience, more informative to collect high quality and consistent data from a few boats rather than irregular data from many. This is particularly true when collecting data on catch-rates, as opposed to the total number of fish caught, which is a very important number in some stock assessment studies. The sheet is designed to be filled in by a single entry for each day. Each day, all the scribe needs to fill in is the date; the number of billfish raised, caught or tagged; the fishing time; wind conditions; water temperature, if known; the fishing location; and an indication of how much time was spent targeting billfish. There is also room for other comments. Information on the size of fish (estimated if necessary) and sex of fish (if captured) should be included here. Any other comments that might also be useful are welcomed. The number of fish raised to the baits is, on the whole, at least as informative as the number of fish caught or tagged. This is because, as anglers are all too aware, often the fish are there but cannot be hooked and often the number of fish hooked reflects differing skills of anglers rather than the number of fish present. We cannot overemphasise that for these logs to be useful, an entry must be made EVERY time the boat goes gamefishing - a zero catch is just as informative as a record breaker. We suggest anglers photocopy the data sheet for later recording. If you do not have access to a photocopier, write to the address on the data sheet and you will be sent further copies.
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