Reading your fish finder

[AnglerBob]

Question for the pros: How do you know what fish are on your meter?

For example, you're at Pyramid looking for stripers and see suspended fish @ 20 feet. Are they stripers, smallmouth, largemouth or trout?

As long as I've been fishing, I'm often not sure, although if I see fish close to structure I tend to think they're bass.

There are a lot of aspects to reading a fishfinder that take some learning. For example, I know bass pros will often see a fish appear on the screen and try to catch that particular fish, but this is easier said than done. If the boat is still, and a fish appears on the meter, all it tells you is that it's entered your cone radius—you don't know exactly where, right?

By the same token, if you're moving and you're at 15 feet but go over a ten foot dropoff, you can see the ledge and drop on your FF, but the apparent steepness of the cliff as "drawn" by your FF will be affected by your boat speed. And if you anchor right on top of the ledge, the ledge will disappear, and the FF will give you an "average" reading of depths within the cone.

Am I wrong?

[GeordyBass]

the fishfinder reads the fishes bladder then determines its size and depth....Dont confide on your fishfinder to tell you if the fish are there.You should use it as a tool to tell you how the structures are....if the fishfinder reads no fish,it doesnt mean they are not there...they may be in a different angle or out of range....just my :My Two Cents:

[BingJr]

In a lake like pyramid, a big school of active fish would be stripers. The LMB and the SMB and trout are not big schooling fish so you would not see big groups on the meter. You can tell by the shape of the image drawn on your finder if the fish is moving or stationary. Really the best way to catch fish you see on your meter is with a jigging spoon. Most of the fish I have seen eat on my meter were when I was using the trolling motor with a transducer mounted on my trolling motor. Geordy is correct in the fact when you are bass fishing your looking more for structure or bait, when you are striper fishing you are looking for fish and bait due to the nature of the species being targeted.

[GdHkSet1]

Bob,
I have an old Eagle F/F on my old 91 Crestliner, when DVL was fishable, that old monochrome F/F could always tell me were those bait balls were I was trolling and the different humps and drop offs. I was targeting the hold over trouts, I would have fish arches under and near the glob on the screen. One of these days I'll upgrade, but that old sucker still works.... good luck

[MarkyMark]

Hate to threadjack, but I got a new Garmin 160 color fishfinder .that I really don't like. I have to change the settings every time I go out..maybe it's me but I don't care for it too much..I prefer my old Hummingbird