Corroborating effort and catch from an integrated survey design for a boat-based recreational fishery in Western Australia

Many recreational fisheries do not have mandatory reporting and rely on probability-based survey data to produce estimates of effort and catch to inform management decision making. Reliable data are required for estimates to be accepted by managers and stakeholders. Estimates were determined from off-site Phone-Diary (PD) and on-site Bus-route Access Point (BAP) with supplemented Remote Camera (RC) surveys over the same 12-month period to compare and corroborate effort and catch estimates for a boat-based recreational fishery in Western Australia. Similar distributions of raw catch data were found among surveys. Effort estimates were comparable for the PD and BAP complemented RC methods. Although catch estimates from the PD survey were generally lower than those from the BAP survey, catch estimates for most species were comparable for the PD and BAP complemented RC methods. The precisions associated with most of the catch and effort estimates from the different surveys were relatively similar and reliable (RSE < 40 %). However, measurement bias influenced catch and effort estimates from the BAP survey. The relatively low cost and availability of a licensing database as a sampling frame favour the PD survey as a long-term monitoring tool for this boat-based recreational fishery. While choice of survey design is subject to management requirements, financial and logistic constraints, this study demonstrates an approach to corroborate estimates for recreational fisheries.