Hello fellow fish warriors!!
Just got a Lowrance Elite 5 Gold fishfinder installed and used it for the first time on Friday. I used the "Fish ID" and "Fish Alarm" settings to fish Salmon and Steelhead at a total water depth of 120 - 150 feet.
The unit went crazy over certain areas, indicating there were 30 fish on the screen at any given time over a troll of 1000 - 1500 feet travel. That obviously made me excited. We caught a few fish in the area, but was suprised after going through "so many fish" we didn't get more.
So, I switched the "Fish ID" off and saw a lot of little dots on the screen, not too much that looked like fish arches. I still don't know what to make out of what I was seeing.
Anyhow, after doing some reading I am confused as to whether I should continue to fish with "Auto Sensitivity" and "Fish ID" or whether to go for a manual setup. If I go manual what would be the optimal settings.
I tried to google this, and after 4 hours I have given up on trying to find anything helpful.
So, for manual settings what I really need to know is for fishing in 120 - 150 feet of water, trying to pick up fish at a level of 40 - 80 feet, should I use the 83 kHz transducer or the 200 kHz transducer? Secondly what is a good setup technique to help me resolve the sonar image into more distinctive fish arches?? Right now, trying to manually judge what a fish looks like on the cluttered screen is almost impossible.
I tried to adjust the sensitivity (starting from zero) to pick up the secondary echo at double the water depth. This didn't seem to work as I wasn't able to pick up the second echo. I don't know if it was because the water was a bit choppy, or whether it is because the unit is too powerful (500W RMS, 4000W PTP).
Any general guidance as to how to optimize the performance of this unit would be greatly appreciated.
Fishing Report Your Name / Boat Name: Pirate's Cove ============== TRIP OVERVIEW ============== Date(s): June 18, 2011 Time on Water: Start - 6:00 am, Finish - 11:00 am Weather/Temp: Sunny, 75F Wind Speed/Direction: No noticable wind Waves: None Surface Temp: 63F Location: Mississauga, in front of Refinery LAT/LONG (GPS Cords): =============== FISHING RESULTS =============== Total Hits: 3 Total Boated: 2 Species Breakdown: 2 Kings (1 lost just before netting), 1 Steelhead Hot Lure: Williams Dartee No 2, Red or Blue Lure Trolling Speed: 3.11 mph Down Speed: Boat Depth: 130 feet Lure Depth: +/- 50 to 60 feet ==================== SUMMARY & FURTHER DETAILS ====================