Socio-economic portrait of Polish anglers: implications for recreational fisheries management in freshwater bodies

Recreational fisheries are an important element of contemporary fisheries. Detailed information about the motivation and opinions anglers regarding catch-and-release fishing in post-communist countries, such as Poland, has not been widely available to date. The aim this study was fill gap. We obtained 936 survey questionnaires completed by from throughout Poland. mean annual catch a Polish angler is 126 fish weighing 46.1 kg. Anglers mainly cyprinids, but they would prefer large predatory fishes, spend average 416.50 EUR on activity annually. These results confirm hypothesis that angling catches Poland decidedly recreational character targeted at consumption lesser importance. Simultaneously, we determined younger more willing release caught than older anglers.