Fish Washington Reviews

by Buckaroo Malt

I can’t believe FishWashington has ads considering the huge license fees WDFW charges anglers. That is pure greed and they should be ashamed.

The maps lack detail such as clearly named waterways so it is very difficult to know what area you are looking at. FishWashington is confusing and difficult to navigate. Of course, if WDFW didn’t have a 150 page regulation guide modified by arbitrary changes so fishermen never quite know if they are breaking rules, we wouldn’t need an app, would we?

This is a perfect example of byzantine government bureaucracy and waste.

by Slash Dog

With the restrictions on sports fishing do to unmanaged tribal fishing you have succeeded in wiping out crabbing, shrimping and salmon fishing. You have discriminated against the majority for political reasons.
The tribes fish thousand of pots and are left to govern themselves. That never works.
Our state Fish and Game dept is responsible for the depletion of our fishing resource. Take off your blinders look around. Our rivers are plugged with nets. 2020 the tribes took double their shrimp quota what do you think they did with crab and salmon? I know this was a waste of time I don't have a casino to wet your palms. Thanks

by Nattybo Dee

I really want to use FishWashington but it crashes my whole phone. I've had apps crash before but never have I had an app render my phone unusable until I completely force-exit out of it. I'll check back and will change my rating if I can actually open and use FishWashington!

Edit: thanks so much for the response! After the update, my whole phone is no longer locking up, but I still can't get past the logo splash screen without FishWashington crashing and closing out. I see the logo for 5-10 seconds, then it crashes back to my home screen.

by George98034

I tried FishWashington when it first came out and it was working. Now with the 1.0.16 build 48 I can’t get the thing to work at all. Half the time clicking on the search bar doesn’t do anything. When I can click in the search bar, I can type something but I can’t actually get it to search. When I click on a body of water it’s not letting me see the rules for it. I tried re-launching FishWashington several times. The sink button works 100%, but I can’t get the 3 dot menu to do anything ever. Menu on the upper left works, but there’s no way to search from there! Please fix this.

by OliFinn

While it’s understandable that FishWashington needs to take a moment/few minutes to update rules and regs whenever it is opened, but FishWashington is currently spinning its update wheel indefinitely. Doesn’t allow you to click on the map, or select a waypoint, it just “updates” for what has now been at least over 30mins for me.
When I try to submit this feedback via FishWashington , it says FishWashington can not connect to the server (and thus the feedback can not be submitted).
Was really hoping FishWashington would be fixed in time for the opening of fishing season.

by Tallcurt

I like FishWashington and it’s concept, it’s super easy to use and quickly check regulations on body’s of water. I do find it hard to know where you are looking sometimes because nothing is named. It would be much better if at least the bigger rivers are named so you know you aren’t looking at a small creek. I often find myself going back and forth between FishWashington and google maps to make sure I am following the right river/creek. The other issue I have with FishWashington is it takes FOREVER for the emergency rules to update and half the time I just get frustrated and close FishWashington . When the emergency rules are trying to update you can’t use FishWashington at all. If it’s going to take forever for them to load it would be nice if you could still at least use the map because sometimes the emergency rules don’t even matter to the bodies of water that I fish. I like FishWashington and the concept but I think it needs further development.

by Lil Rowbot

1st a question: does FishWashington provide up to date salmon steelhead fishing regulations for rivers (Columbia river, Snake river, etc.)?

If I was able to get past the “Updating regs. This may take a minute..”, I would be able to answer this question myself.. However, FishWashington downloads the regs fine, then stalls updating for 10+ minutes before I get frustrated and shut FishWashington down. I’ve tried updating FishWashington , re-installing FishWashington , and waiting for much longer than the ‘minute’ of updating.. to no avail.

This is a great move forward with Washington fishing regs, especially for salmon/steelhead fisherman who have to dig through the abyss of emergency regs to find out if/when/where we can fish for these beasts.. I don’t understand why it has to be so difficult to determine if I can or cannot fish on a specific river. Idaho makes it infinitely easier to read regulations, maybe Washington can take a page from their book, or maybe the whole book...

by Jrose13

After installing, I tried to use location services to pinpoint my place in the map. It crashed FishWashington every time. After 4 or 5 tries (relaunching each time), it finally worked.
When I select a location, I’m seeing only directions. There’s a blue box with the name of the location and repeated directions, and that look like a button (complete with 2 tight arrows) but tapping in it does nothing. Additionally, the filters for the map are very limited.

by Busta-Busta

My first review appeared to be portentous. The thing is a hassle to actually use. The updating regs/sync doesn’t update or sync in a timely manner- if at all. I’m a bit of a tech guy and frankly, deleting and reloading three times? No bueno. The thing doesn’t update 97% of the time. It just spins and spins. Not handy at the dock or at home.
I believe FishWashington has promise ( hence two stars) given the menus and the map.
Fix the sync/update issues and this might be an okay product. Again, we paid for this (mightily if you look at your license fees) to Work.

by Reachej

I’ve had FishWashington for a few months and am looking forward to it being useful. It crashes often and doesn’t update very easily. The actual rules are confusing to read and seemingly not current. Last year’s rules are still there for example. I could never rely on FishWashington to be sure about regulations for a given area without worrying that maybe it is not correct and risking a ticket. I’m sure they’ll get there at some point.

by DSHaven

FishWashington is somewhat useful, but supported by ads? For crying out loud! This is already paid by our taxes! Now ads?

For novice fishermen- forget FishWashington. No pictures of fish to identify, map is riddled with waterways and lakes and hard to pinpoint your actual location.

I have no idea why it’s so highly rated. Total 90’s app.

Developer, here are suggestions to make it 5 stars:

1. Remove ads
2. Make waterways overlay gradient (min/max slider)
3. Include pictures of actual fish species, so it’s easy to identify for novice
4. Identify “all” designated ramps including rivers ( not all currently present)
5. Create pop-ups for general rules or exceptions (instead of clicks to “next” screen)
6. Create geolocation ping to tell users what regs are in their present location
7. Incorporate fishing license info purchase, so it’s “all” in one app - purchases, current license, renewals.

Otherwise FishWashington is a glorified map.

by Builder68

Emergency regulation updated (highlighted in yellow)for all species (fish,crab,shrimp etc) should be placed at the top of the pop up regulation window when clicking on a specific marine area from the map. This is currently being done for salmon but don’t see it for shrimp etc. also marine area 7 (as well as some other marine areas) is/are divided into a few different sections or sub areas (west,east,south etc. ) but again this information is not displayed in the pop up regulation window when clicking on a specific marine area from the map.
Would have sent this feedback from the “feedback tab” in the menu but it never allows me to send, just says try again when you have an Internet connection. So that really needs to be repaired.
Keep at it, it’s getting better.

by Emore1978

I do wish there was more info on individual lakes and rivers ( pictures of the body of water, history, more info on the types of fish contained in the body of water. It would be great to have a comprehensive tips page(s) on techniques just like Oregon Fish and Wildlife.

More info on shore/bank fishing. FishWashington is really interesting most states don’t have an app.

by Seth Marquart

Love that app. Super innovative. Really useful tool, but if there was some way to filter things out a bit cleaner it might help. Like say, select a certain species of game fish, and then have the map highlight all of the bodies of water where it is legal to fish for that species. And if FishWashington was able to give notifications that give emergency closure info or special openings... also would be cool. Thanks.

by Badger Strider

A little difficult to understand some of the regulations at first, particularly for salmon/steelhead rules, however with time it becomes a great resource. Especially since it syncs for off-line use.

The biggest issue is the ads running on the bottom of the map screen. While WDFW is in need of proper funding, using taxpayers money to develop an app that runs ads is disappointing at best and illegal at worst. One of the most egregious ads was one from the NRA recruiting new members with a “stand and fight” banner. How is that even close to being acceptable on a platform developed using taxes?

by Moll Flanders

This is my new favorite app! I am so glad to see WDFW creating content like this. The fact that it’s an official WDFW product more than makes up for the few ads. The basemaps are great and I love being able to actually see where all the crazy stream sections are described in the regs.

My main suggestions are:
1. Finish adding shellfishing regulations, e.g. clam digging. Bonus points for listing public clam beaches and including psp updates in the emergency regs!
2. Make it so you can buy a license straight from FishWashington . Michigan already does this and it’s great - you can buy your fishing license on your phone from the boat ramp. Mind you, they don’t have as much CRC reporting as we do, so I don’t believe they charge a fine on license purchase for an unreturned CRC. But WDFW could easily send a fine by mail for unreturned CRCs, or tie it to an angler’s SSN and require that for purchase.
3. Make it so we can pay to remove ads.

Thanks, folks! Keep on improving it!

by Sloan37

Everyone seems to be frustrated with the bugs that FishWashington is having. I on the other hand think that FishWashington is extremely helpful and if used efficiently saves you the time from references the Regs in the WDFW pamphlet/guide. I like that I can find an area I’ve been looking into. Click on the river and have it display all the regulations for that portion of the river.

by Team Redford

Me and my son like to fish new areas and new types of fish,now that he’s away in college it shortens our window to spend time together scouting new spots and finding out how to fish them. Being able to tap a body of water on the map and getting to know it’s name, the fish in it and all the regs for that area of water is PRICELESS!!!! Can’t thank you enough !

by Deezyyygshhehudu

As I said it gets buggy every once in a while and I have to restart it but all in all it’s a great app. Our regs can get pretty complex and confusing and this makes it so much easier to navigate that. There’s no excuse to not know the regs when it’s this easy to look them up.

by The Real Turtleman

I recently updated FishWashington and now can no longer access the map. Please fix. Other than this incident, I’ve loved FishWashington .

UPDATE: My issue has been corrected with the most recent iOS update. Revising my rating back to a 5. Thanks to the developers for reaching out to me.

by ZacharyDuschik

FishWashington served me greatness the first week of having it but now all it does is when I open it asks me to sync it. Once it reaches 100% it stays there for 5 minutes and then fails. Major bug fixes needed! Maybe make it more compatible for all users? And make the regulations easier to understand for some people learning how to fish. Would save a lot of trouble in the future in case you run into a game warden.

by Thefamousbicycleride

Takes up a gigabyte of storage and doesn’t include fish identification or, as far as I can tell, an easy way to see regular limits on all fish in a simple list from the menu. It would also be nice to have a list or map function that tells all the places you can possibly catch a particular species or at least a list of common fish caught in each body of water. Other than that, pretty cool app.

by Traplive

First the good. I love the maps and boundaries. Very helpful when on the water. I also like the regs tab that provides species, seasons, and gear restrictions. Now the bad. It updates constantly. More often than not, the update fails. Even when connected to WiFi. Add a feature to disable updates until requested. Just put a disclaimer that your fishing spot may be subject to changes.

by Fan Of Starbucks

I was excited to get FishWashington, but every time I open it, it gives me a message that says it failed to sync and the last time it synced was April 18, 2018. I have tried to get it to sync, but it won’t. Even with the last bug fixes, I am still having issues. How do I fix so I can use FishWashington ?

Updated review and changed from 3 stars to 4 stars. I deleted FishWashington and re-installed it per Jake’s instructions. Took a few try’s to get the information updated from the Dept. site but it finally did update and it’s working fine so far. I just hope that I don’t have to uninstall/reinstall every time there is an update available. You might work on that for the next updates. Thanks.

by Guck Free

I like FishWashington . Regs are updated instantly. I can click on a river and find out everything I need to know. It only updates when I log into FishWashington so I may have to wait a few while it updates changes. I’d like it a lot more if there was some kind of angler chat and/or fish reports. All in all I like FishWashington