Measuring fishing effort is important for assessing the environmental sustainability of fish stocks and the socioeconomic efficiency of fishing activity. Fishing effort describes the amount of fishing gear used on a fishing ground over a given unit of time. Effort in this case is defined as number of creels hauled per day per 4 km2. This survey interviewed 198 creel vessel skippers from four regions, two on the west and two on the east coast of Scotland. This analysis has been produced from these SAMPLED vessels only. This IS NOT a census and IS NOT a map of all creeling effort in these waters or in the survey areas. This is an indication of potential fishing effort only and if creeling is not quantified in an area in this map, that DOES NOT mean creeling is not taking place. Equally quantified effort could be higher given some creeling vessels were not surveyed. Fishing effort outside of the surveyed area was not measured.
