Data from: Encountering a bait is necessary but insufficient to explain individual variability in vulnerability to angling in two freshwater benthivorous fish in the wild

Fish personality traits, such as swimming activity, or personality related
emergent behavioural properties, such as space use, should affect
encounter rates between fish and fishing gear. Increased encounters should
in turn drive vulnerability to capture by passively operated fishing
gears. However, empirical evidence documenting a relationship between
activity-based behaviours and vulnerability to capture in the wild is
limited. Using whole-lake acoustic telemetry, we first documented
significant repeatabilities over several months of a suite of encounter
rate-associated behaviours (swimming distance, activity space size, time
on baited feeding sites, switching frequency among baited feeding sites,
distance to the lake bottom) in two recreationally important benthivorous
cyprinid species, the common carp (Cyprinus carpio) and tench (Tinca
tinca). We then experimentally targeted both species using standard
angling gear on baited feeding sites. Individual fish regularly visited
the angling sites, documenting that the fishes encountered the angling
baits. Carp were readily hooked within the first few days, after which
catchability dropped to low levels characteristic of tench from the onset
of the angling experiment. When attempting to explain individual variation
in vulnerability, we failed to document significant relationships among a
suite of repeatable encounter-based behaviours and vulnerability to
angling for both species. There was also no evidence for size selection or
for energetically less conditioned carp to be more vulnerable than their
counterparts. The data cumulatively suggest that fine-scale behaviours
after encountering a bait (e.g., frequency of bait intake, or degree of
spitting baited hooks following ingestion) are ultimately decisive for
determining vulnerability to angling in both species. We therefore
conclude that encountering a stationary bait in angling for benthivorous
cyprinids is a necessary, but insufficient condition for determining the
likelihood of capture of an individual fish. Hence, fishing-induced
selection on encounter-based behaviours in recreational angling for
benthivorous fish in the wild appears unlikely.