Fishtory throws line in sea of ‘citizen science’ data
A NEW project to gather data on historical fish stocks is depending on local anglers, ocean enthusiasts and other potential citizen scientists to contribute photographs and information.
The Fishtory research team of Prof Warren Potts and Tanith Grant from Rhodes University invited all with photographs and stories to share to a meeting at the Port Alfred River and Ski-boat Club last Thursday.
Researchers cannot collect and kill fish for information and it is necessary to gather information through “citizen science”, particularly as Fishtory is not government funded.
Local angler Wade Labuschagne contributed an angling magazine dated 1963 and photos of fish his grandfather, Eldred Bradfield, caught as a young boy, which Grant scanned onto the database.
There are about 850 000 anglers in South Africa. If they each catch five fish a year at an average size of 1kg it adds up to 4250 tons a year. It is more than 29 inshore hake trawlers which catch 2 390 tons of hake in a year.
“Recreational fishermen have a greater impact on fish stocks than people realise,” Potts said.
When commercial fishermen see that the stocks are going down, they stop fishing until the stocks recover.
But recreational anglers may notice that fish stocks have decreased or fish sizes have decreased, and yet continue to fish. As a result, fish stocks may continue to decrease.
In the mid-’90s, popular recreational fish like the dusky kob declined by 25% and shad between 25% and 40% in a year.
Since then, these fish stocks may have declined still further. Bronze beam and poenskop have never been assessed.
In some places the fishermen may get together and agree to stop fishing in a certain area for a certain length of time, until the fish stocks have recovered.
It is important to research fish stocks because of the contribution recreational fishing makes to the local economy in terms of jobs, fishing charters and licences in small towns like Port Alfred.
CatchReport allows fishermen to log, track and share their catches. This information goes onto a national database to give a clear picture of South Africa’s marine ecosystem.
Anyone with old photographs and articles can submit their data to