Fishing Log Empirical Analysis System

Fish Swami's Fishing Log Empirical Analysis System is a very powerful tool that can be used to glean interesting information from your saved fishing logs. This tool is made possible by keeping a fishing log at Fish Swami instead of a written log, where any trends or statistics would need to be generated by hand.

Click on one of the links below to read more detailed help information about that section of the Empirical Analysis System page.

• My Saved Queries
  • Edit and Delete Saved Queries
• I Want To Know...
• ...Based On These Criteria
  • Fish Species
  • Water Name
  • Water - Specific Location
  • Pattern Type
  • Pattern Name
  • Pattern Color
  • Weather
  • Time of Year
  • Time of Day
  • Water Temperature
  • Air Temperature
  • Barometer
  • Hatch
  • Insect Seining
  • User

My Saved Queries

The My Saved Queries section allows you to save queries you have formed so you can easily run them again at a future time. If you have not previously saved any queries, then the drop-down list for your saved queries will be empty. To run a previously saved query, select the query from the drop-down list, then click the Run Saved Query button.

Edit and Delete Saved Queries

If you would like to edit one of your saved queries, first select the query from the drop-down list and click the Run Saved Query button. Once the query is run and the results page is generated, you will notice Edit and Delete links at the top of the page. If you click the Edit link, the page will refresh with all of the fields selected and filled-in appropriately for the data you originally entered for the query. Make any changes you wish to any of the form values. If you are confident that your changes are exactly what you want, scroll to the bottom of the page and click the Save Query Changes button. Otherwise, click the Find Answer button to run the query but not save the changes to the original saved query.

To delete one of your saved queries, select the query from the drop-down list and click the Run Saved Query button. Once the query is run and the results page is generated, you will notice Edit and Delete links at the top of the page. Click the Delete link. A dialog box will ask if you are sure you want to delete the query. Click yes.

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I Want To Know...

The I Want To Know... section is used to determine how to group the data from your fishing logs. The values you choose here will result in columns on the results page. The most common result that you will want returned is Fish Caught - Total. Perhaps the most basic query you can do on your fishing logs is to determine the total number of fish you have caught, ever. To do this, check the Fish Caught - Total value from the I Want To Know... item list, then scroll to the bottom of the page and click the Find Answer button. The results page will show you the total number of fish you have caught. Easy!

As a second example, we want to know how many fish we've caught for each fish species. To do this, check the Fish Caught - Total value from the I Want To Know... item list. Since we're trying to find out how many fish we've caught for each fish species, we also need to know the fish species. Check the Fish Species value. That is how you select multiple values to get returned on the results page. Now click the Find Answer button at the bottom of the page. Assuming you have entered fishing logs containing more than one fish species, you should see a table similar to the following:

The more items you select in the I Want To Know... list, the more columns will be displayed on the results page, and the query results will be grouped for each column. For example, if you wanted a breakdown of how many fish you've caught of each species in each month of each year, you could check the Fish Caught - Total, Fish Species, Year, and Month fields. The results page would resemble (note that there will likely be several rows in this table):

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...Based On These Criteria

The ...Based On These Criteria section is where you constrain the values that you want to query your fishing log against. This is how you can limit the search to only include fishing logs for Brown Trout, or to only include fishing logs for May, June, and July, 2007. The following sub-sections detail how to make selections in each of the fields to get the results you want.

Fish Species

The Fish Species field constrains the search results to only include fishing logs for a particular type of fish or types of fish. For example, if you wanted to find out how many largemouth bass you've ever caught, you would select Largemouth Bass from the Fish Species scroll list. After pressing the Find Answer button, the results page would show:

You can also select multiple Fish Species values to search against. For instance, you can find the total number of rainbow and brown trout caught by selecting Brown Trout and Rainbow Trout from the Fish Species selection list:

Lastly, you can select a category of Fish Species to search against. To find the total number of warm water fish you've caught, select the Warm Water value in the Fish Species selection list:

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Water Name

For the Water Name field, one input box allows you to enter in the name of a water you wish to limit the search results to. To see the number of fish you've caught on the Madison River, enter the text Madison River in the input box. The results page should resemble:

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Water - Specific Location

The Water - Specific Location fields allow you to refine your search based on specific county, state, and country location information. Simply type in the desired values into the appropriate fields.

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Pattern Type

The Pattern Type selection box is used to find information based on whether the fish was caught on a fly, lure, or bait. For example, to find the total number of fish caught on a fly, select Flyfishing from the selection box.

Similarly to the other selection boxes, you can select more than one pattern type by holding down the Control key (Windows) or Command key (Mac) while making selections.

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Pattern Name

The Pattern Name selection boxes are used to find information based on specific types of patterns. These fields allow results to be based on individual patterns or pattern groups such as Dry Fly, Spinnerbait, or Artificial Bait. To find the total number of fish caught on a Woolly Bugger, select Woolly Bugger from the Flyfishing selection box.

To find the number of fish caught on any type of Crankbait, select the Crankbait header in the Lure selection box.

Any combination of pattern names can be used to refine your results. For example, we can find the number of fish caught on nymphs (fly fishing), a Griffith's Gnat (fly fishing), plastic worms (lures), a Bomber Model A crankbait, Berkley PowerBait (bait), or nightcrawlers (bait).

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Pattern Color

The Pattern Color selection box constrains the search results to flies or lures of a particular color or colors. One or more colors can be selected by holding down the Control key (Windows) or Command key (Mac) when selecting values. To see how many fish you've caught on Black or Red flies or lures, select Black and Red in the selection box.

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Weather

The Weather group of checkboxes allow you to limit fishing logs based on various weather conditions. You can limit results to when it was windy, when it was snowing, or when it was overcast. Weather influences fish activity, and Fish Swami's fishing log entry design allows fishing logs to be easily searched and grouped based on various wind, precipitation, and sky values.

For a first example, we want to find how many fish we've caught when it's been overcast and very windy. Check the row of checkboxes under the Skies section for the Cloudy row. Next, check the row of checkboxes under the Wind section for the Heavy row. Leave all of the other boxes unchecked.

By default, the values you select in the various weather sections are OR'd together. That means, if you check boxes for Skies - Afternoon - Cloudy and Skies - Evening - Mostly Cloudy, fishing logs will be returned in the results if either the skies were cloudy in the afternoon or the skies were mostly cloudy in the evening. To instead restrict the results to include fishing logs where the skies were cloudy in the afternoon and the skies were mostly cloudy in the evening, select the AND radio button below the weather fields.

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Time of Year

The Time of Year section allows you to refine the search results based on date ranges for fishing trips. It is easy to find information for individual years or months, or for date ranges. As with the other selection boxes, to select more than one value in a list, hold down the Control key (Windows) or Command key (Mac) while making your selections.

To find the number of fish caught in June 2006, select 2006 from the year selection list and June from the month selection list. You can select All Days from the Days selection list if you like; if you do not make any selections in the Days list, the All Days value will be used by default.

To find the number of fish caught during the first half of May for the last 5 years, select 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004, and 2003 in the Years selection list, May in the Months list, and select 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, and 15 in the Days selection list. You will need to hold down the Control key (Windows) or Command key (Mac) while selecting the Years and the Days.

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Time of Day

The Time of Day section can be used to limit the fishing logs returned to only those where fish were caught during a specific time of day. The following is a list of valid values for the start and end times:

• start 2:30pm to end 5:30pm - limits fishing logs where the start time was at or after 2:30pm and the end time was before or at 5:30pm
• start 11am to end - leaving the end field blank means fishing logs will match if they start any time after 11am (11:00 to 23:59)
• start to end 6pm - leaving the start field blank means fishing logs will match if they end any time before 6pm (00:00 to 18:00)
• start 0800 to end 1300 - limits fishing logs from 8am to 1pm

To find the total number of fish caught during the hours 6:00pm to 9:30pm, enter the text 6:00pm in the start field and 9:30pm in the end field. Alternatively, values of 1800 and 2130 could be entered in the start and end fields, respectively.

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Water Temperature

Water temperature is a critical factor in determine activity levels of fish and insects. Fish Swami allows you to easily search your fishing logs based on water temperature. The following is a list of valid values for specifying water temperature:

• 55 - fishing logs will be included if the water temperature was exactly 55 degrees
• >54 - fishing logs will be included if the water temperature was at least 55 degrees
• <56 - fishing logs will be included if the water temperature was 55 degrees or below
• 50-54 - fishing logs will be included if the water temperature was between 50 degrees and 54 degrees

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Air Temperature

The Air temperature section is useful for limiting the returned fishing logs to those where the air temperature was in a specific range. The following is a list of valid values for specifying air temperature:

• 75 - fishing logs will be included if the low air temperature was less than or equal to 75 and the high air temperature was greater than or equal to 75
• >60 - fishing logs will be included if the high air temperature was at least 60 degrees
• <50 - fishing logs will be included if the low air temperature was less than 50 degrees
• 50-70 - fishing logs will be included if the low air temperature was at least 50 degrees and the high air temperature was less than 70 degrees

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Barometer

The Barometer section is useful for limiting the returned fishing logs to those where the barometer reading was in a specific range. The valid values are similar to those for air and water temperature.

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Hatch

The Hatch section can be used to restrict the fishing logs returned to those where a certain species of insect was hatching or on the water. For example, to find the number of fish caught when PMD mayflies were hatching, select Pale Morning Dun from the Mayflies section in the Hatch selection list.

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Insect Seining

The Insect Seining section can be used to restrict the fishing logs returned to those where a certain species of insect was seined for in the river or lake. Its usage is identical to the Hatch section's usage.

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User

The User radio buttons allow you to query against either only your own fishing logs, or all public fishing logs. This can be useful to compare the your own results for certain conditions against everyone else's.

Protected or private fishing logs are not used when All Public Logs is selected.

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