Fishing/Training

Introduction

This page goes through the general method and tips of training the Fishing skill. Fishing is a common skill that players choose to level early, as it is an efficient money maker, allowing players to quickly expand their bank slots and begin to explore more game features.
Additionally, Fishing, by random chance, can result in the drop of beneficial rings. Specifically, the Ancient Ring of Skills and Ancient Ring of Mastery. When worn, these rings boost the skill experience for non-combat skills and all skill masteries by 7% respectfully. Their drop rate is provided in the Fishing Special section.

Equipment

There is no requirement to start Fishing. One should always use the best Fishing Rod available for purchase in the Shop.

Boosters

The Firemaking Skillcape provides an additional 5% experience to all skills.
The Pirates Lost Ring provides 15% bonus fishing experience when equipped (This can be found while fishing).

The

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Amulet of Fishing

provides 20% decreased Fishing interval (This can be found from opening Treasure Chests).

The Fishing Skillcape doubles the amount of fish caught.
The Fishermans Potion reduces the chance to catch junk, therefore increasing catch rate. The chance increases based on the level of Fishermans Potion. A level of 40 Herblore is required to synthesize.

Training

In general, it is recommended to always fish the highest level fish that your level currently allows. Selling the fish should result in enough gold to upgrade to the best available Fishing Rod in the Shop.

Junk

Changing fishing targets too often has one downside, and that is Junk. Junk provides 1 xp when received, greatly reducing both xp/hr and gp/hr received while fishing. Players will receive Junk at a fairly high rate (20-30%) while fishing until their total master progression is at 65% (5,575,000 Mastery Experience) or when the mastery level for an individual fish reaches 65. It is recommended that a player either uses Fishermans Potion or only changes their fishing target every five to ten levels to reduce the likelihood of receiving Junk.
For fish a player may want to fish for long periods of time, like Sharks, Manta Rays or Whales, it is valuable for the player to spend experience from their mastery pool to level the fish to 65, in order to remove the chance of receiving Junk.

The single most efficient item for training fishing to obtain is the

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Amulet of Fishing

. Action time reduction vastly outweighs experience bonuses when training for long periods of time.

Supplemental Information

As provided in the Fishing Special table, there is a 0.15% chance when receiving a special item to receive the Message in a Bottle. This will unlock the Secret Area. In this area, there are three fish: The Raw Seahorse, at 15 fishing, Raw Skeleton Fish at 45 fishing, and Raw Magic Fish at 80 fishing.
But most importantly, each fish has a higher (+3%) of receiving special items while fishing.

It is recommended that the player fish Raw Skeleton Fish in this area. Raw Skeleton Fish are one of the best source of prayer points in the game. Spending time fishing for Raw Skeleton Fish is the most likely method of obtaining rare special items, like the rings or amulet mentioned above.
It is valuable for the player to spend experience from their mastery pool to level the fish to 50, in order to further increase the likelihood of catching special items.