The Paraná flows with its two banks in different countries, and anyone fishing near the border runs into something that confuses everyone: the rules are not just different, they are reversed. Here is the full picture, with the regulations on each side and when each fact was checked.
Paraguay: a spring closed season for all sport fishing
Every year MADES, the environment ministry, decrees a closed season for sport and commercial fishing during spawning, by resolution (the one for 2025-26 was Resolution 523/2025). The pattern repeats: it starts in the first days of November. In waters shared with Argentina it runs until December 20; in waters shared with Brazil, until January 31 of the following year. During that period there is no fishing, neither sport nor commercial, with the sole exception of subsistence fishing by riverside fishermen holding a commercial licence, from the bank.
On top of the annual closed season, MADES can issue extraordinary measures. In September 2026, Resolution 430/2026 banned fishing aimed at a migratory shoal of dorado on the Paraná for as long as it stays concentrated, without closing fishing in general.
The fine for fishing in the closed season is not symbolic. Fine of 3,001 to 20,000 minimum daily wages, today Gs. 351 to 2,342 million.
In exchange, outside the closed season the Paraguayan system lets you keep fish within the rules: there are minimum sizes per species (golden dorado 70 cm, and 75 cm on the stretches shared with Argentina under the binational regulation; surubí 85 cm; anything below goes back in the water) and you need the MADES licence. Foreign anglers also have a trophy limit: a single dorado or surubí, plus up to two other fish (Res. SEAM 650/13). The full detail is on the licence, closed season and sizes page.
Corrientes: no spring closed season, but compulsory release
On the Argentine side the system is the exact mirror image. Corrientes does not follow the Paraguayan closed season: when MADES closed the season in November 2025, the Dirección de Recursos Naturales made clear that no new closed season applied in Corrientes waters and that fishing continued under the usual regime.
That usual regime is Disposition 853/22 of the Dirección de Recursos Naturales, and its central rule is a single one: golden dorado and surubí are catch and compulsory release, all year round. No bag limit or size lets you keep them. For other species there are bag limits and sizes, and a provincial licence that is processed online at recnaturalesctes.gob.ar.
We checked that 853/22 is in force on 6 October 2026: Disposition 1054 reinstated it on 29 September, when it lifted the extraordinary closure that, from 9 September, had closed all fishing on a stretch of the Paraná that moved with a shoal of dorado. It was the second one of 2026: in June Corrientes imposed and lifted another at the confluence in less than a week. So confirm it at the source before you travel.
The mental table worth taking with you
- Want to fish in November or early December? In Paraguayan waters you cannot: it is the middle of the closed season. On the Corrientes side fishing goes on, with dorado and surubí released, unless Corrientes declares an extraordinary closure.
- Want to keep a dorado or a surubí? Only on the Paraguayan side, outside the closed season and above the size limit. In Corrientes they always go back.
- Do you only fish catch and release? Then the calendar barely changes on one side, and on the other it takes away November and a good part of December.
And a warning that applies to both banks: the licence does not cross the border. Each country requires its own and both sides enforce it, on the water too.
Planning the trip
The exact dates of the Paraguayan closed season change each year and are confirmed at mades.gov.py; what is allowed each month on this side is in the month-by-month calendar. The areas to fish when the season is open, in the fishing areas. And for the Argentine side of the river, the guide is Iberá Experience.