Lowrance Screen Shots

 This is a picture I took yesterday morning when I was working a school of Stripers. We had located and set up on them about 10 minutes prior to this picture. We had 8 rods hook up at once but by the time they took the fish off the hook the school had left. I fired the big motor up and went the direction I thought they were heading. About 200 yards away I ran over the school. On the left side of the sonar screen you can see a little motor noise interference [vertical black dashes] because I was running about 25mph. Just as soon as I saw the beginning of the school [ just on top of the ledge, smaller red dots] I put my shifter in neutral and as ran to the front of the boat to put trolling motor in while my clients got up and readied their rods for bait. I baited them, they put them down and 30 seconds later all the rods were hooked up. You can see on the sonar that as the boat slowed the arches got bigger and bigger. I had only slowed down to 1.1 mph but as I slowed even further after I took this shot the screen turned to spaghetti and that is when we hooked up. The sonar page works better than the down scan at speeds in excess of 5 mph as you can see in the picture. Once I slowed down enough the down scan picks up the fish as well as the side scan in the upper blue page. I then used the side scan to stay on the school by turning the boat 90 degrees and I maneuvered the boat in the direction that I saw most of the fish.

I took this picture while I was catching daytime bait. You can see on the sonar page all the Herring between 10 and 20 feet deep. On the history page in the upper part of the sonar page you can also tell how long I had been on the school which was massive, probably about 40 yards wide. The down scan shows the bait as well but is showing more definition. Notice that I can see the individual baits clearly which helps me distinguish what kind of bait it is. The side scan portion of the picture shows how wide the school of bait was and tells me there is more on the left side of the boat than the right so I threw on the left side of the boat and captured enough bait to finish the day.

My journal shows a lot of pictures of Stripers but my Lowrance is the main tool I use in locating bait and fish to put my clients on. I have used Lowrance for over 40 years, always catching plenty of fish, but this technology and understanding how to use it and how to interpret what I see is one reason why we consistently put our clients on fish. If I could just get them to listen to me when a fish gets on my life would be a whole lot better. If you enjoy my posts of Lowrance shots let me know and I will continue to post them. If you have a Lowrance and have a question about it email me and I will try to help you. One of my guides Anthony Hicks and myself are Pro Staff Navico, which Lowrance is part of. If you want to learn more about reading and understanding Lowrance , consider booking a trip. When you leave at the end of the day you will know your depthfinder, how to locate, set up and catch fish and also have torn up thumbs from taking fish off the hook.

Fishing is fun, Catching is the Bomb!