Originally posted by Reften:

Just fish in the meadows very close to water, and don't cast far (of course cast where fish are). Keep reeling in and casting again with the free bait, will level up your fishing. Also watch or fish laying aruond on land, that is how our squad gets most of our fish....

Getting "fish" is easy but that is not the goal or shouldn't be of fishing.. if you are looking to get the best stam food in the game you specifically need angler fish which you can only get in mistlands.

The only way to get that is to catch the "special" biome fish from each corresponding biome to make the next level of bait to then catch the next fish..

If you find a single giant herring on the shore in the swamp you can bypass most of this and make the bait to catch groupers. There you will want to spend a little more time and you will want to catch around 10. 10 will afford you the ability to make 400 misty bait so 400 anglerfish.

Also, Fishing skill is pretty much meaningless. As long as you use 3 stam foods, fish on a boat and don't cast further than 10m away then you will not have an issue reeling in your catch.