Best Fishing States: See Where Arizona Ranks

ARIZONA — With National Hunting and Fishing Day coming up Saturday, fishing enthusiasts in Arizona can take note of how the landscape here compares with other states and regions nationwide.

The lawn care company Lawn Love has ranked all 50 states, including Arizona, to find the best and worst places to fish in the United States.

The ranking — which takes into account community interest, water sources, access to fishing gear and the cost of fishing licenses — puts Arizona at No. 49, making it the next-to-worst fishing state in the country.

Arizona ranks 48 in community interest, 47 in access, 39 in cost and 42 in supplies in the 2021 Best and Worst States for Fishing.

It might be too late for anglers to plan a National Hunting and Fishing Day trip to the No. 1 fishing state, Alaska, this weekend due to its distance from the U.S. mainland. The Last Frontier State ranked No. 1 in the unofficial ranking with its more than 600 species of fish across millions of lakes.

Fishing has become a “culture staple” in Alaska, the report states. But despite coming in No. 1 overall, Alaska placed last in affordability. The state charges more than any other for a fishing license.

The Last Frontier State is followed by Michigan, Maine, Rhode Island and Florida in Lawn Love’s top five. Michigan placed first in the ranking’s “access” category, due to the state being surrounded by four of the five Great Lakes, and having the longest freshwater coastline in the world. The Wolverine State is also home to nearly 65,000 lakes and ponds.

Coming in at the bottom of the list, in ascending order, are Nevada (the only state worse than our own Arizona,) followed by Arizona, New Mexico, Kansas and Nebraska. There’s still ample opportunity for fishing in these states, however, Lawn Love points out.

Although Nevada is the driest state, it does offer “quite a few” lakes for fishing. Arizona and New Mexico, the report points out, both have numerous rivers for fishing.

Lawn Love used data from a number of outdoor stores in bringing certain criteria to determine the states’ ranking in the community, access, cost and supplies categories of its list.

In determining community rank, the majority of weight was put into the number of fishing licenses issued per capita, with the number of fishing competitions and number of fishing charters and guides also taken into account.

For access, the percentage of the state that’s covered by water was given the most weight, followed by number of marinas per 100,000 residents, shoreline mileage and coastal or landlocked status. The number of fishing trails per state was a factor given less weight.

The cost of fishing licenses, tags, permits and stamps per license holder was the only factor determining a state’s cost rank.

And for supplies, the number of fishing gear stores per 100,000 residents was given double the weight of bait and tackle shops per 100,000 residents.