I also have a horrible habit of misplacing things, and, while I carry one of our strap-packs in the vast majority of times I go fishing, I have on occasion carried different packs that I was testing out. Once I arrived at my destination without a fishing license, just to have a ranger greet me on arrival. It gave me a good chance to ask him if a picture of my license or just my fishing license number would be enough (alas I didn’t have either on my phone anyways on that trip). He informed me that it is a gray area here in Colorado, rangers may choose to check the database (if they have network connectivity) and allow you to go fishing, but most, he said, will ask you to stop fishing if you don’t have a physical license.
So, here’s a quick tip: put your fishing license inside of your phone case. This will work on any case of course, but if you have one of the cases with a clear back, such as the Lifeproof cases which have become popular among anglers, you’ll not have to remove the case to show your license.
If you are anything like me, your phone has become your main camera and is always with you. This will make sure you don’t leave your license in a different fishing bag or in your wallet in the car. I started doing this just a couple of weeks ago but had several people mentioning that was a great idea….so, just in case you also have this problem, there is one solution.