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Posts: 99
| Just curious has anyone ever seen a muskie on their sonar? And been lucky enough to catch it? You would think with all the side imaging etc that people would mark muskies on sonar but I have not read or seen screen shots of anyone who has. |
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Posts: 300
| I've seen fish on the sonar. My wife and I were lucky enough to fish LOTW, and several times we'd mark fish,band then have them follow. |
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Location: Contrarian Island | has happened lots of times over the years...especially with suckers... mark em on the sonar and they chow the sucker.... we were drifting off a rock hump last fall getting ready to move to the next spot and we saw this one down on bottom..I grabbed the sucker out of the livewell, lowered it down 20 feet to the fish....and felt it wack it w the rod in my hand...handed it off to buds little guy and bingo...
Edited by BNelson 4/14/2015 7:39 AM
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Posts: 2894
Location: Yahara River Chain | Say....that kid looks like a champ  |
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Posts: 243
| ^^^ Yep, has happened several times. Fun to call your shot when you see them on the graph. I marked one a few years back and worked that fish for 6 hours off and on before she ate---48.5" out of a small lake. She never left the spot and I could see her every time I made a pass. |
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Posts: 1023
| Yes. I've seen many fish behind suckers on the graph and then...POW!
Called my shot once when there was a friendly guide right next to me. Told him to have his client cast at my bow because there was a fish below it on my sucker. His client made the cast and halfway in, the fish ate the sucker and we stuck the fish. That was a fun fish. |
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Posts: 5874
| Great kid pic!
Yup with suckers happens all the time. Trolling the deeper waters, too. Haven't fished with the side imaging, but I'm hearing that you can see the fish quite easily.
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Posts: 1283
| I havent on mine, but I have seen them on a guides graph. Didnt catch it though. |
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Posts: 1220
| The easiest way to get used to seeing the muskies is on the regular sonar display up front on your bow-mount while you vertically jig bait pods in open water. It's a question of learning to make certain the bait's inside your cone, the boat's moving slowly enough, you have enough sensitivity applied in the sonar menu, and your chart speed is dialed down to match your fishing. As you refine this process, you will begin to see yourself lift and drop your bait very clearly on the graph perfectly. When you first begin, you may not see a darn thing. After you get the idea of how to create the proper settings, you'll see the big blob when she shows up. Don't look for a "hook" because the boat is not moving fast enough to make a hook. At a low speed a fish will be a horizontal line or, hopefully a blob-a-saurus. It becomes a hook with speed and then a vertical line with more speed. This won't be a waste of time for you, if you are doing it around pods of bait fish. By the time you see a musky, you'll have already used the net a few times when they swam up too fast to notice. |
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Location: Grand Rapids, MI | Many times, in fact my largest to date was marked on the graph and eventually caught about an hour later. It's really cool to see them while vertical jigging come up and hang with the bait for a minute then go back down and come back and eat. My favorite was seeing one in a friends boat on the side imaging and a few seconds later the planer board rod on that side went off. |
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Location: Sawyer County, WI |
I've seen what I believed to be musky or larger pike, but I apparently don't have the experience to differentiate a 35 inch pike from a 40" musky.
So, aside from "big arc = big fish, biggest fish in lake is musky, therefore big arc = musky" how does one really know what it is unless you're using a camera ? |
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Posts: 20180
Location: oswego, il | Yes and the best one was with my kids in the boat on Webster. My olderst was in the back, I seen the fish on the graph, told him to make a back cast, 44" ate his bait boatside. |
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Posts: 99
| Nice! May have to give the jigging thing a try. Doesn't seem real popular around here. I just got side imaging. You would think that you could see muskies if they are hanging around points humps etc. |
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Posts: 1971
| all the time on suspended fish, caught a 46" last year trolling the basin ...tight bait ball , nice arch...said to my partner "there is a muskie chasing bait right there" , 10 seconds later the reel is screaming |
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Posts: 32801
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | This one was on the sucker, swung out away and smoked it on the run.
(15493_10152855760299929_1608263221945929406_n.jpg)
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Posts: 5874
| I see. I saw. I have seen.
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Posts: 633
| I won a guide trip, and took my son with me. We were going between 2 points dragging suckers. The guide, and I were talking, and we were looking at the graph. Nice arch at 12 feet with suckers at 6 feet. We both stood up, and start looking at the suckers. Saw the fish come up, and nail one. We handed the rod to my son, and got a nice 42" fish. |
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Location: Sawyer County, WI | Shep - 4/14/2015 3:26 PM
I see. I saw. I have seen.
Here's one for you Shep.
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Posts: 246
| I usually see them after they follow and hang out deep under the boat. Frustrating. |
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Posts: 718
| Very common when vertical jigging. I shot this when jigging Bondy's on our home waters. You can see the bait hoping along and then a musky comes into the picture and...the blood starts flowing.
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Location: 31 | It took a while to develop a feel for it, but I'm confident I've seen muskies on the Lowrance side scan, and then caught them at 3-4 MPH. It’s always way cool, and it would be easy to jump to conclusions even though there's really no way to be certain. However, it's happened so many times now that I've ruled out coincidence, now whether we would have caught the fish without seeing it first is another story. One that really comes to mind is from a couple years ago when I pointed out what appeared to be a decent sized cruising muskie to my boat partner Phil, and we both started watching the planner boards on the starboard side closely. The boards never flinched, but one of the reels went click-click-click very slowly, and if we weren't watching it so closely, we would have wrote it off as a weed. However, I instinctively turned the boat hard port and canned the 9.9 just in case… bang fish-on, and we ended up catching a decent fish that we might not have caught otherwise. For me it was one of those defining moments when everything just kind of came together in the boat, the high tech system worked crazy good and everyone was where they needed to be. Afterward we just kind of looked at each other like… wow, did that just happen? My theory is the fish swam up and closed its mouth on the bait, swimming right along with the boat until we sped up, either that or it missed the bait and then came back and hit it… either way being dialed into the technology has been credited with that catch. If you watch Wicked Tuna, they call them out almost every time anchored with live bait.
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Posts: 568
Location: Lake St Clair | Bondy - 4/14/2015 8:05 PM
Very common when vertical jigging. I shot this when jigging Bondy's on our home waters. You can see the bait hoping along and then a musky comes into the picture and...the blood starts flowing.
Very cool! |
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Posts: 99
| I see what ya did there! That darn see saw seen gets me every time. Lol |
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Posts: 718
| You can see that jig going downriver and how much water you can cover in a day. If we weren't drifting it would look alot different. |
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Posts: 1202
Location: Money, PA | All the time....St Clair is classic for just that! |
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Posts: 37
| My fishing buddy and I were looking at what we thought was a musky on sonar. He left his lure in the water and suddenly it crushed it. Needless to say we had to do a little celebrating after that. His first muskie too! |
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Posts: 1405
Location: Detroit River | Several years ago I took this kid (21 yr-old who was a little slow) out pike fishing on LSC. We were drifting in about 8 fow & the kid is looking at the sonar & said, "What’s that?" I said, "Either a big musky or a sturgeon". The kid then proceeds to cast a bass spinner bait over his left shoulder then starts staring at the sonar & not bothering to reel his bait in. The next thing you know this upper 40's ski comes thrashing out of the water with the kid's spinner bait is in its mouth & the kid's pole bent in half. He ended up losing the fish & I was in total disbelief at what had just happened. |
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Posts: 617
Location: Clintonville, WI | I've only seen this a few times, but my electronics weren't that good and I wasn't using them to their fullest capabilities. That said, I've upgraded electronics and have done more homework on using them, with improved results (d'uh). However, I can't say that I've caught a fish that was identified on the electronics - yet.
Tom Gelb showed some photos of his screens at a recent seminar of his. Holy smokes.....talk about huge bait pods and monster arcs showing up. He spoke about many instances when fish caught were ID'd on the screen first.
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Posts: 27
| ToddM - 4/14/2015 11:56 AM
Yes and the best one was with my kids in the boat on Webster. My olderst was in the back, I seen the fish on the graph, told him to make a back cast, 44" ate his bait boatside.
Same thing happened with my wife in Canada. Saw one on the locator in front. Said we just went over a musky and cast behind the boat. She was just humoring me, but a mid 40" grabbed her spinnerbait, went airborn and tossed it. She was so suprised she didn't set the hook. |
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Posts: 284
Location: Eagan, MN | Surprised folks are NOT seeing muskies on sonar. We commonly see them and drop a bait to catch them. Cool to watch them approach the bait just like when ice fishing for other species - as shown above by Jon. Granted, a majority of the fish we see on sonar don't strike, enough do to make this a very exciting thing. Have lots of stories, but won't bore you with them other than one. I had the pleasure of losing a monster fish 2X on one cast; the second time being right at my rod tip. The fish went straight under the boat, directly under the transducer and sat there, wondering what happened. We got to see what a monster fish looked like on screen and, let me say, it was a rather impressive 'mark'. |
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Posts: 572
| Have had it happen about a 1/2 dozen times or so on LOTW. Bring the bait in, figure 8, see nothing, fire off another cast only to look down at locator and see a big line, bring bait in quickly and start figure 8'ing and boom, musky eats. |
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Posts: 258
Location: Mayville, WI | Did not catch this one, but here's one tending a school of cisco (right side of screen).
sc
Edited by scmuskies 4/16/2015 11:20 AM
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Posts: 246
| Forgot about this pic. It followed in and after going around the eight once it disappeared. At the end of the next cast I see this on the sonar. I never did get that fish to eat.
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Posts: 2691
Location: Pewaukee, Wisconsin | Seeing fish while jigging is very common and easy to learn how to use your electronics to your advantages .
Trolling and seeing fish then catching them is a little harder to predict and know which rod will get hit by that fish. You can see depth but don't know where it is in the cone. Could be left right front or back.
Seeing fish on side imaging takes lots of time and attention to detail but can be done. Planner boards are great to get these fish. You know the distance away from the boat by figuring out the side scan scale(60 ft scale) fish is in center of side scan screen = 30'. The shadow of the fish will help you determine dept of the fish. That's the hard part but you can learn to read this after a bunch of hours of watching and studying your electronics.
I have called out rods to watch as we trolled over fish lots of times and had them start ripping line just as I pointed them out.
You can also judge size of the fish to some extent. Large fish of to the side of the cone angle will not show up so large. Just as a smaller fish might show up larger if its dead center of the cone.
Trusting and knowing your electronics is one of the most important tools we all have in our boat. Spending the time to learn your electronics to your best ability is something 90% or more fishermen do not do. 50% only know the basics I would bet.
For suckers and jigging its a blast to watch your graph. The anticipation before the strike is awsome. But the letdown also comes into play as a muskie chases around your sucker then leaves. All in all your electronics are the best tools in your boat. Learn to use them and understanding everything they can tell you will put more fish in your boat than any other piece of equipment you own
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Posts: 1220
| After reading Mike's (extreme) post above, Jon Bondy's, all the screen shots guys post....I get the feeling that there are a bunch of the folks here who have figured a lot of this out already. To their credit, probably many figured it out all by themselves too. Naturally, some actually make their living at this and I know a lot of electricians who can wire a whole #*^@ house too. And, I'll take credit for being able to re-wire a lamp--no problem at all. But I suspect, a lot of guys have never seen these images on their own screens, and have in fact, most depended on their graphs to keep their prop from hitting the bottom of the lake while they wonder about those fish-shaped images they have selected. Trust me, I've spent some time with this, I've been to Dr. Sonar's all-day class twice, I watched Gregg Thomas give his seminars on electronics (and he's likely not too far behind Dr. Bruce Sampson) but I think this is still harder than it looks for a lot of guys. And, the new Ranger I ordered will still have an 1199 Bird at the console because I am just not ready for the newer (beter?) touch screens and the "next-gen" world just right at this minute. Like most of these subjects, "Not all of us are where some of us are!" I am positive that some of you guys are saying, "I don't see this crap on my unit," and I say that because, frankly, It took me a long #*^@ time before I was seeing this crap on my unit! And, I still think I'm pretty darn bad at it, when some young punk gets in my boat (that would be you Kyle) and messes up my unit so bad (doing stuff that young guys do) that I can't put it back to where I can find the bottom without a full system reset. (even though I think 3.5 MPH is too fast for the best use of SI) So, if you other guys (guys who took remedial math like me, and were told to learn a trade where I could work with my hands) are thinking....yea I don't see that crap either,,,just take a darn class or get someone to teach you, and take my word for it....it is harder than it looks! And Mike Koepp?? He should just catch fish for his clients and please keep his shirt on while on the water....it's bad enough to watch him net all the fish on Pewaukee lake without having to see that too! |
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Posts: 688
Location: Already Gone | I'm right there with you Marty...lol.
Mike makes it sound pretty easy, but I'm already working on being much better this season with my HBird electronics. I know I'm not getting everything out of them.
DI is very cool in the right hands...  |
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Posts: 45
| My son and I were trolling open water on Cedar (Ont.) last year when we noted a school of baitfish and a hook, followed by another school of baitfish and a second hook, immediately both rods went off and we boated a pair of chunky 40 inchers.
I see them on the screen often, but they usually don't eat.
Rich Wren |
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Posts: 95
| Spencer Berman has a image of one on the side imaging and you can make out the gill plate and tail. It's pretty cool maybe he could post it here |
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Posts: 2691
Location: Pewaukee, Wisconsin | I am sorry if it sounded easy to use graphs and understand them to their full potential. My experience with my hummingbird goes back 7 years with lots of upgrades via downloads. Every time I downloaded the latest version I had to learn new stuff and set my graph up the way it best served my needs. I can tell you its not easy to learn these electronics but taking the time to understand them instead of just fishing helped me see the world under my boat and around it much clearer.
Side imaging was the hardest to understand. Using the side scan in areas I know extremely well has helped me to see what it looks like on the graph. Knowing how tall the weeds or structure is before I see it on the side scan helped me understand the shadows. By testing my graph interpretations and then going over the structure and checking it visually I was able to learn a lot.
My best advice to anyone looking to understand their electronics better is to go out on the lake, just play with them until you trust and know how they work. Or work with someone who has the same electronics you have and pay attention to every detail they show you.
Graphs can be customized and set up for the individual using them. I have helped many set up their graphs and showed them things they never adjusted or knew they could.
Are electronics easy to learn.....hell no. But how many of us will spend 10 to 20 hours learning every part of your graph once you get a new one. Most will not. They will get the basics and start fishing.
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Location: 31 | Identifying fish that you have a high degree of confidence in is cool, but to me the biggest advantage with the Lowrance structure scan is hands-down the efficiency it provides on the water. Being able to map out areas in less time is a huge advantage, something along the lines of the difference between cutting a large lawn with a 72” deck versus a push mower.
I think it's fairly easy to identify fish you think are muskies when you're moving slow, or even at trolling speed over deep water with conventional electronics. However, the SS took it to a whole new level for me to quickly and accurately identify shallow water areas, and the bonus of seeing fish holding off to the side of the boat. You can actually watch their movement as you make trolling passes sometimes…
Another advantage with the SS is that it allows for more precise trolling passes once you get things dial-in, it's almost like there's no water as I approach an area I am familiar with now. For instance; when I used to troll open water weed beds without SS, I would just kind of go back and forth over them with the spread, never being exactly sure where my board rod baits were in relation to the weeds. Now my typical routine with SS is to put the 2 outside planer board lures right in the strike zone, with the boat off the side of the area for the first couple passes. When the fish are really on; I get a kick out of saying “watch those outside board rods” and then having one go off. |
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Posts: 114
| Here's a giant sitting under some walleyes that were gorging on emeralds. The shiners were so thick that when you stomped on the bottom of the boat the surface exploded with fleeing baitfish.
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Location: Mauston, Wisconsin | BrainF - Shhhhhhhhhhhh! Secret technique - learn to use your sonar's. Side scanning is awesome advance. I'm not shure about 360deg scan yet - haven't ridden in boat with one. Yes- see them-target them........
Ask Spencer B. if you can spot them, we saw several muskies on my HB 997SI fishing on the first Presque Isle MF Outing... including a real big fish that was ~ 40' in front of Landy's boat. I shouted there was a big fish in front of his boat, we were idling along in opposite direction and headed out to the reefs on Clear. LOL- they were casting to shore, I don't think he believed me. Hit the middle reef ~ saw a muskie sitting on the south deep side transition line. Spencer brought her up on a LB'r Dog. My trolling batteries were shot from fighting wind all day, so I went to north side of the reef and let out anchor w/enough rope to put us over the spot - that I had marked on my SI HB. We had two suckers down at ~20-24' - A few minutes later my sucker comes to the surface and jumps out of the water - I laugh and say - "now thats a nervous sucker". A couple of casts later with deep water rubber bait (secret weapon) I feel a heavy weight, set hook & no bonanza. It was getting late for Sat night get together at the lodge, so we called it a day (Cocktail Hour) . We fished with Howie the next day and I brought the secret weapon w/ me and told Howie the story. He took it and bent it and showed us the teeth cuts, some impressive marks - LOL - he has that bait!
Shhhhhh - don't ask, don't tell!
Have fun!
Al |
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Posts: 31
Location: Illinois | This is the best image I have seen. Side image zoom shot that is really detailed. This was Trolling at night with a guide. Never caught it, but I often think about how big it might have been!
Edited by benckdb 4/24/2015 6:03 PM
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Posts: 815
Location: Waukee, IA | That's amazing. I can't wait to get my new sonar on the water |
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Posts: 99
| I believe this was a Muskie that followed my bait in. Never saw it though.
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Location: Contrarian Island | happens a lot ... just yesterday had a few follows that came up on the locator late... 1 stayed 5 feet below the TM/locator..so I dropped my dawg down...watched it go down to the bottom with it... then jigged the dawg back up and a nice fat 43 was right on the dawgs tail... locators don't lie!
Edited by BNelson 11/16/2015 10:30 AM
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Posts: 523
| I caught a 44" last night trolling that I saw on my side scan, pretty awesome to see the fish on the screen then get the rod dang near ripped out of your hand a few seconds later!!! |
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Posts: 1283
| Since I originally posted in this thread I upgraded my bow unit to a Helix 5 and have seen quite a few fish I believe were muskies. I have not caught the fish, but have seen them, and can now even see the bait when jigging when it enters the cone. Pretty cool stuff! Dont have any pics of the skis but have some of giant baitballs and jigging trails. |
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Posts: 400
Location: Metro | Always fun to read the sonar and then look back to see if the suckers start freaking out. Went out with buddies yesterday on Tonka and we had a fish chase the sucker all they way to the boat and the bobber was drifting back a decent distance from the boat. =[
Still a very cool experience.
Sad to say I am very new to sucker fishing and something had gone wrong over the summer that loosened my little wheel next to the drag. So when I put everything into the fish the drag slipped and I wasn't able to keep pressure on the fish |
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Posts: 246
| Saw this exact image while casting and had a follow a few casts later coming from the direction I drifted over. It went around a few times and then disappeared. After getting to the end of the flat, I went back up across the flat casting and I saw this. Didn't follow this time.
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Posts: 79
| here is the best ive gotten:
[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v332/ffib/c22fc89c-ba36-416c-ba6d-5a74dd1390f0.png[/IMG]
couple more:
[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v332/ffib/95e1f88d-8d2c-4840-a10c-4f036af124ad.png[/IMG]
[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v332/ffib/84d965d3-2b7a-45a0-bc22-8edf86cf75ad.png[/IMG]
[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v332/ffib/shot%2026.png[/IMG]
[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v332/ffib/shot%2035.png[/IMG]
and just for fun....
[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v332/ffib/shot%2019.png[/IMG]
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Posts: 99
| Those are some nice images! |
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Posts: 127
| Musky952 - 11/16/2015 1:02 PM
Sad to say I am very new to sucker fishing and something had gone wrong over the summer that loosened my little wheel next to the drag. So when I put everything into the fish the drag slipped and I wasn't able to keep pressure on the fish
Tip: Put your thumb on the spool when setting the hook on a sucker line. Even if you have the drag locked down it could still potentially slip on the hookset. |
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Location: 31 | 169sportsman - 11/17/2015 11:41 PM Those are some nice images! I pulled this image from ffibs collection. This is what a shallow water muskie looks like with a Lowrance side scan... basically just a white line and shadow.
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![[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v332/ffib/c22fc89c-ba36-416c-ba6d-5a74dd1390f0.png[/IMG]](http://smg.photobucket.com/user/ffib/media/c22fc89c-ba36-416c-ba6d-5a74dd1390f0.png.html){kind=link}
![[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v332/ffib/95e1f88d-8d2c-4840-a10c-4f036af124ad.png[/IMG]](http://smg.photobucket.com/user/ffib/media/95e1f88d-8d2c-4840-a10c-4f036af124ad.png.html){kind=link}
![[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v332/ffib/84d965d3-2b7a-45a0-bc22-8edf86cf75ad.png[/IMG]](http://smg.photobucket.com/user/ffib/media/84d965d3-2b7a-45a0-bc22-8edf86cf75ad.png.html){kind=link}
![[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v332/ffib/shot%2026.png[/IMG]](http://smg.photobucket.com/user/ffib/media/shot%2026.png.html){kind=link}
![[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v332/ffib/shot%2035.png[/IMG]](http://smg.photobucket.com/user/ffib/media/shot%2035.png.html){kind=link}
![[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v332/ffib/shot%2019.png[/IMG]](http://smg.photobucket.com/user/ffib/media/shot%2019.png.html){kind=link}