Preserving the Future of Florida’s Fisheries
The Florida Friendly Fishing Guide Certification is a program established by UF/IFAS, Florida Sea Grant and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission recognizing fishing guides who are committed to preserving the future of Florida’s fisheries through sustainable boating and fishing techniques.
Florida Friendly Fishing Guides provide a richer fishing experience for their clients through their angling expertise and environmental stewardship.
Become a Florida Friendly Fishing Guide
Participation in the Florida Friendly Fishing Guide program is completely voluntary, and the program involves no regulatory component.
This online certification course covers science-based techniques that ensure minimal environmental footprint of fishing. The course can be accessed via computer or smart phone/tablet. The course takes approximately four hours to complete and can be taken at your own pace in 20- to 30-minute chunks.
Once you complete the course, you can display your certification on your website and vessel, letting your customers will know that you adhere to the highest environmental standards. The certification is valid for three years. You will be listed on the Florida Sea Grant website as a certified guide at https://archive.flseagrant.org/find-a-florida-friendly-fishing-guide/. The $130 fee covers gear for the welcome packages for certified guides, program upkeep and evaluation, and administrative expenses such as web hosting.
If you have additional questions prior to registering for the course, please email Mike Sipos at sipos624@ufl.edu.
What the course covers
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Introduction to Fisheries Management
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Best Practices for Catch and Release Fishing
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Seafood Safety and Handling
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Sustainable Waste Management and Fueling
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Overview of Marine Ecology
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Environmental Ethics
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Sustainable On-board Materials
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Giving Back to Fisheries Management and Research
What comes with the certification?
What guides are saying
“I appreciate you providing such a program, imperative for all boat captains to participate in. In fact, my business partner and I are currently hiring boat captains, and we are going to require that they participate in this program.”
“I found the information in the course very helpful and informative and I will certainly be adjusting some of my practices to incorporate what I learned here… Thank you and all of the team that put this all together- well done!”
“Excellent program! I consider myself to be pretty “salty”, but I actually learned some very valuable techniques!”
“In my opinion, the information in the course perfectly addresses topics specifically related to our jobs as Florida charter captains.”
“I enjoyed taking the course and while I considered myself fairly knowledgeable on the topics I definitely had a few misconceptions and learned quite a bit.”