Thread: reading a fish finder

i have a hummingbird 525 fish finder and i not sure whats the best setting to start with.as far as white lines,fish ID,upper and lower depths.i see alot of structure but no fish.i troll for crappie and i will see a school of shad but i cant stay on top of them.so if anyone would have any tips or any info you would really be helping me and my kids.thanks a lot

I also have a 525 and love it. The way that I started out is set everything on Auto until I got very familiar with it. I haven't changed it yet. I have stuck with the Auto.

I have a 325 on the trolling motor and a 727 on the transom. I like them both. Mid range settings seem to be the best. I don't use the fish alarm but the fish ID can be adjusted to pick up the bigger fish or down to the big minnows. Get around some structure that you know exactly where it is and then work back and forth adjusting up and down till you see what you know is down there and the fish. Bait schools can be deceiving. The 325 shows them as a glob of black dots but the 727 will show them as what appears to be static or just an area of floating debris or it will show them in small groups. Smitty and i saw them so thick in a cove that it appeared to be the "thermocline" but was just a huge amount of bait because the line moved up the water column when we put the lights out. For trolling I would use the most sensitive setting on the fish ID. If you have a dual beam you can maybe able to adjust the narrow beam and the wide beam differently. Good luck. I have had the 727 for a couple months now and still learning what the different menus and settings will do. Maybe some one on here can tell you more.