Privacy policy

What stays on your device

To remember your choices, Gonnachum uses your browser’s local storage. It stays on your device and is never sent to us:

• the setups you save in the Digital Tackle Box;
• your catch log: the fish you log, when, what you caught them on, their size, your notes, the name of the water and, when you logged it from the Fishing Finder, that water’s position and the conditions there;
• your last choices in the Gear Matcher and the Budget Rig Builder;
• which items you have ticked on the first-trip checklist;
• the state you picked for its fishing license and regulation links and for the fish guides’ best months;
• if you came from one of our Google ads, the ad’s click ID, for up to 30 days, until you tap an Amazon button (see “Our Google ads” below);
• in the Fishing Finder, the water temperatures recently read by stream gauges near the place you searched, and the flow and level of the rivers you picked, kept for an hour so that looking again is quick;
• in the Fishing Finder, your search radius, target fish, water clarity and the last place you searched, which can be your location if you used “Use my location”, and the state that place is in, so the fish guides can show that state’s best months;
• also in the Fishing Finder, the federal recreation sites and the fish reported near the places you searched, kept for a day so that searching the same place again is quick;
• also in the Fishing Finder, the named lakes, rivers and other water found around the places you searched (with the piers and boat launches mapped beside them), kept for 24 hours so that searching the same place again is quick and asks the map servers for nothing.

You can remove all of it at any time by clearing this site’s data in your browser’s settings. In the Fishing Finder you can also press the ✕ beside your place to forget it. The counts described in “What we count on our own server” below are separate: a few words about what was used, never any of this.

Backups. In the Digital Tackle Box, “Back up to a file” saves your catch log, saved setups and checklist as a file on your device, and “Restore from a file” reads one back. The file goes where you save it; it is never sent to us. When you log your first catch, Gonnachum asks your browser to keep its saved data when space runs low; your browser decides, and nothing leaves your device.

The Fishing Finder and your location

The Fishing Finder doesn’t need an account, and we never see where you are. Your browser contacts these services directly, so each one sees your IP address along with the request it receives (the water search, federal recreation sites and fish records, below, are the exceptions: those go through our own server):

• Mapbox maps (api.mapbox.com, tiles.mapbox.com and events.mapbox.com, from Mapbox)

  Draws the map and the satellite view. It receives which part of the map you are viewing. When you pick a water, it also receives the position of the water’s boat launch, pier or fishing spot (or the water’s own), to find the nearest road or parking a car can get to, for the directions link. Its map library also sends Mapbox anonymous usage information (that a map was loaded, and on what kind of device), as Mapbox’s terms require.

• Water search (OpenStreetMap data, asked through our own server; the Overpass API, at overpass-api.de, overpass.openstreetmap.fr and similar servers run by the OpenStreetMap community, when our server can’t answer)

  Finds the named lakes, ponds and rivers near your search point, and the piers and boat launches beside them. Your browser asks gonnachum.com for your search point rounded to about a kilometer, and the radius. Our server answers from its own copy of OpenStreetMap’s water data, or asks the Overpass API on everyone’s behalf, naming Gonnachum and a contact address; Overpass then receives only our server’s request, never you or your address. Our server keeps standard logs of what was asked for (the time and the page, not the place) and remembers each answer for a day. Only when our server can’t answer does your browser ask the Overpass API itself, which then receives your IP address, the point (latitude and longitude, rounded to about 100 meters) and the radius, and a note that the search comes from Gonnachum.

• Mapbox search (api.mapbox.com, from Mapbox)

  Suggests towns, lakes, rivers and parks as you type in the search box, the ones near you first, and says where the one you pick is. It receives the text you type, and the search point you already picked (rounded to about 100 meters) to put places near it first; with no search point picked, it uses your IP address for that.

• PAD-US public land (services.arcgis.com, the U.S. Geological Survey’s Protected Areas Database, published on Esri’s ArcGIS Online)

  Says which public land is beside a water you pick, and shades public land on the map when you turn that on. It receives the water’s position (rounded to about a meter), or the part of the map you are viewing.

• National Weather Service (api.weather.gov, a U.S. government service)

  Provides the forecast, and the air pressure measured over the last few hours at the weather station nearest your search point. It receives the coordinates of your search point, and then the name of that station.

• U.S. Geological Survey (api.waterdata.usgs.gov, a U.S. government service)

  Provides real water temperatures from its stream gauges, when one near your search point has read one in the last day. It receives a box about 35 miles around your search point, with the point rounded to about a kilometer. If it is unavailable, the Fishing Finder estimates the temperature instead. When you pick a river or creek, it also provides the flow and level from a gauge on it: it then receives a box about 10 miles around that water, and the gauge’s number.

• Recreation.gov (ridb.recreation.gov, a U.S. government service, asked through our own server)

  Lists federal recreation areas and facilities where fishing is an activity. Its access key is confidential, so your browser asks gonnachum.com, and our server asks Recreation.gov. Recreation.gov never sees you or your address: it receives only our server’s request, for your search point rounded to about a kilometer and the radius. Our server keeps standard logs of what was asked for (the time and the page, not the place) and remembers each answer for a day. Gonnachum is not affiliated with or endorsed by Recreation.gov or any federal agency.

• GBIF (api.gbif.org, the Global Biodiversity Information Facility, asked through our own server)

  Lists the fish that people and surveys have reported near a water, to show “Fish reported nearby”. GBIF asks every program that uses it to say who it is, which a browser cannot do, so your browser asks gonnachum.com and our server asks GBIF, naming Gonnachum and a contact address. GBIF never sees you or your address: it receives only our server’s request, for the water’s position rounded to about 100 meters and how far around it to look (about a mile, or five miles where few fish are recorded). Our server keeps standard logs of what was asked for (the time and the page, not the place) and remembers each answer for a day. The records are published by many contributors; only those under licenses that allow commercial use are shown. Occurrence data: GBIF.org.

Your browser only asks for your precise location when you press “Use my location”, and you can say no. You can always search for a place or tap the map instead. These services are run by other organizations and follow their own privacy policies: OpenStreetMap Foundation, Mapbox, Esri, the National Weather Service and the U.S. Geological Survey.

Directions. When you pick a water, its card has a “Get directions” link that opens Apple Maps (maps.apple.com) or Google Maps (google.com/maps) in a new tab. Nothing is sent to Apple or Google until you tap it, and the link carries only the water’s position (or that of its boat launch, pier or fishing spot, where one is mapped, or the nearest parking or road a car can use when the road nearest it is a freeway, ramp or bridge), not yours. To plan the route, the maps service may then ask for your location, under its own privacy policy: Apple or Google.

State license and regulation links. “Buy a license” and “Fishing regulations” open the state wildlife agency’s own pages in a new tab. Nothing is sent to the agency until you tap one, and the link carries nothing about you; the agency’s site then follows its own privacy policy.

Visit statistics and hosting

We use Cloudflare Web Analytics to see how many people visit and how fast pages load. Cloudflare describes it as privacy-first and says it doesn’t collect or use visitors’ personal data. The site is also delivered through Cloudflare, which, like any web host, handles each request (including your IP address) to deliver pages and protect the site from attacks. To tell people from bots, Cloudflare also runs a small check in your browser on each page and may store the result in a cookie (cf_clearance). Our own web server keeps no log of visits or IP addresses. We don’t use any of this to identify or follow individual visitors. See Cloudflare’s privacy policy.

What we count on our own server

To learn which parts of Gonnachum help people find gear, the site counts a few things visitors do, on our own server. Each is a short note about the site, never about you:

• a page viewed: which page, and for a fish guide, which fish;
• an answer shown by the Gear Matcher, the Fishing Finder or the Budget Rig Builder: the fish, the kind of water (pond, lake, river or creek) and, in the Budget Rig Builder, the budget;
• a change to the Gear Matcher’s or the Finder’s choices: which choice, and what it was changed to (“river”, say; a fish picked by name is not said);
• a setup saved to the Tackle Box: where it was saved, for which fish and which complete setup, not what is in it;
• a complete setup (the Gear Matcher’s checklist for a rig) shown, and whether its rigging steps or its other rig were opened: which setup, and the fish (what you mark as gear you have stays on your device and is never sent);
• a tap on an Amazon button: where the button was, which part of the kit it was for (the lure, the line…), the product’s Amazon number (ASIN), the fish, the complete setup it was in, and whether it was a premium pick, or for a whole kit how many items it had;
• a tap on a fish guide’s pick or its gear buttons, and which share button was used.

What is not kept: your IP address, your browser or device, cookies, any ID for you or your visit, the page you came from, where you are, or the time to the minute. Your browser sends the notes a few at a time; our server checks each one against the list above and drops anything else, and writes down only how many of each note came in each hour. It keeps no order and nothing that links one note to another, so they can’t be put back together into anyone’s visit. Like any web server, ours sees your IP address while it receives them, and uses it, in memory only and for an hour at most, to limit how many can come from one place; it is never written down. The counts are deleted after about 13 months. They are for us alone, to improve the site; we don’t share or sell them.

If your browser sends Global Privacy Control or Do Not Track, the site sends none of these notes.

Amazon links

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Buttons that say “Check price on Amazon” open Amazon search results in a new tab. They carry our Amazon Associates ID, so if you buy something after clicking one, we may earn a commission. It costs you nothing extra. We don’t see what you buy or anything about your Amazon account. Once you are on Amazon, Amazon’s privacy notice applies, and Amazon may use cookies and see that you came from our site. We don’t show Amazon prices ourselves, because they change often; check Amazon for the current price.

Our Google ads

We advertise Gonnachum with Google Ads. When you click one of our ads, Google adds a click ID to the address of the page it opens (gclid, gbraid or wbraid): a code Google made for that click. The page keeps it in your browser’s local storage for up to 30 days. If you then tap an Amazon button, your browser sends that code, and nothing else, to our own server, and forgets it. Once an hour our server passes the codes it has received to Google Ads, with the time of the tap, so we can tell which ads lead people to gear they want, and then deletes them. We don’t send Google your IP address, the page, the product or anything you saved, and no Google code runs on the site. Google already knows about your ad click; what it does with it is described in Google’s privacy policy, and you can manage ad personalization at myadcenter.google.com. If you didn’t come from one of our ads, there is no click ID, and none of this happens.

The JABLABZ badge

The footer of every page shows a small badge for JABLABZ (jablabz.com), a friend’s project that lists sites on a wall. The badge is an image your browser loads from jablabz.com when it comes into view, so JABLABZ receives your IP address, your browser’s usual request details and the address of our site (gonnachum.com), not the page you are on or anything you do here. If you tap the badge you go to JABLABZ, which gets the same, and our code in the link, so it knows the visit came from us. We don’t send JABLABZ anything else, and we don’t receive anything from it. What JABLABZ does with what it sees is up to JABLABZ.

Sharing

The share buttons on the fish guides are plain links. Nothing loads from Facebook or X, and nothing about you goes to them, unless you tap one; then that site’s own privacy policy applies. “Text message” and “Email” open your own apps with the link written in, and “Share…” opens your device’s own share menu. We only count which button was used, not who used it.

Cookies

Our own pages don’t set cookies. Cloudflare’s bot check may set one (cf_clearance, described above). The services above, the JABLABZ badge, and Amazon once you click through, are separate websites and may set their own.

Your choices

• Say no when your browser asks for your location. The Fishing Finder still works with a search or a tap on the map.
• Clear this site’s data in your browser settings to remove everything saved on your device.
• Use your browser’s privacy settings or a content blocker to stop the analytics script. The site works the same without it.
• Turn on Global Privacy Control or Do Not Track in your browser, and the site sends none of the notes we count on our own server.

Children

Gonnachum is for a general audience and isn’t directed at children under 13. We don’t knowingly collect personal information from anyone, children included.

Changes

If this policy changes, we’ll update this page and the date at the top.

Contact and map reports

Questions about this policy, or anything else: email [email protected].

The Fishing Finder’s “Report a map problem” form sends us what you write, your email address if you give one (so we can reply), and what it shows you before you send: the place you searched and, if you picked one, the water (its name, position and OpenStreetMap or Recreation.gov link). Our server emails the report to us through Zoho Mail, our email provider, and keeps nothing of it but a standard log line (the time, and whether it was sent). We use reports only to fix the map and answer you. To keep spam out, the server limits how many reports one connection can send in an hour, counted by its IP address, which it keeps in memory for that hour only.