Maximum size of fish caught with standard gears and recreational angling

We correlated maximum lengths of freshwater fishes captured during 10 years with standard gears (i.e., gill nets, boat electrofishers and trap nets) and angling from Nebraska water bodies to determine which methodology provided better estimates of maximum size of fishes produced within a given water body. In general, maximum length of fishes captured with standard gears was smaller than maximum length of fishes captured with angling. Although significant (based on sequential Bonferroni adjustment) correlation was found in only one of nine sport fishes assessed, all correlations were positive indicating a general trend between maximum size of fishes captured with these two methodologies. At present, one cannot reliably predict the maximum size of fishes that is likely to be caught with angling given the maximum size of fishes captured with standard gears during routine monitoring of a fishes population.