Thread: Reading a depth finder

The newest information is on the right side, and it moves into ‘history’ as it goes left. Whatever you are seeing on your screen is directly under your transducer wherever it is mounted on the boat.


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Think of shining a flashlight at a wall. The light produces a circle of light or cone on the wall. The closer the flashlight is to the wall the smaller in diameter the circle or cone will be. The further away the larger the circle or cone will be. Just like the flashlight your transducer does the same thing underwater. Deeper water=larger cone while shallow water=smaller cone.

Next is determining how close to directly under the transducer the target is. Your unit is color so anything directly under the transducer will show vivid red. As the target gets further away from center the color will turn more yellow. You marked a single fish over a small object like a piece of brush pretty much dead center under your transducer. As you continued you picked up the edge of another part of the brushpile.

The fish on top of that pile was directly under your transducer. You went directly over the brushpile with the transducer but the 3rd fish is on the edge of the brushpile. Brushpile is located at the edge of a very slight drop off. You approached the edge of the drop off from the deeper side first.

If you have old school black and white models never fear. You can still see the same things except you have to interpet the closer to under the transducer as the images that are darker. Don't confuse this with telling hard from soft bottoms based on this criteria.

I say brushpile but at only 3' of water it may be more like a branch with a solid structure like a stump showing under the first two fish.

Pac gives good info.
If your near a bass pro or the likes they send in sponsored guys from huminbird, lowrance, and garmin periodically for free training seminars. You can attend any brands class as they all function the same way.. They teach their latest model so none of the model specific stuff will transfer to your model so no particular class makes much difference....unless you choose to upgrade....then you need about 12 new threads to decide.
I attended a Lowrance class, the guys were great and it paid off cause I teach my dad how to use his garmin and huminbird. I use Lowrance FWIW.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Crappie.com Fishing mobile app

Drive over something you can see under water..Rock,Stump..Then look on your depth finder...

Good fishing...

Sent from my SM-J337A using Crappie.com Fishing mobile app

If you fish Horseshoe any, come get in the boat with me for an hour or so and i'll run through it with you live on the water.

There is a wide range of electronics and brands . Old 2d shows shapes . The imaging units give way better details and can see what your looking at wether side or down imaging . Then you get into real time units like livescope . No longer just shows a slice/view as it moves along but full scan in real time . Nothing like imaging till this real time stuff came out . Like playing video game seeing fish and cover in real time . Put your bait on fish and see them move to take the bait !
My view is with the side imaging best for searching up to 100' both sides of your boat . Livescope being real time isthe cats meow for actually fishing .
I run one for maps on my bow along with livescope next to it . My big Humminbird set on maps linked to another big Humminbird side imager at steering console for searching and marking cover . I even added a external GPS antenna with heading sensor to front unit to stop donut hole ( regular or buit in antennas only show direction pointed on screen if moving ) this is great for staying on a spot without using marker bouys ! My advice is buy biggest unit you can afford whether imaging or livescoping .





Last one is Crappie on a brushpile in real time on livescope. You can actually see if they swim away or target them in real time .

Originally Posted by Pac in Arkansas

Think of shining a flashlight at a wall. The light produces a circle of light or cone on the wall. The closer the flashlight is to the wall the smaller in diameter the circle or cone will be. The further away the larger the circle or cone will be. Just like the flashlight your transducer does the same thing underwater. Deeper water=larger cone while shallow water=smaller cone.

Next is determining how close to directly under the transducer the target is. Your unit is color so anything directly under the transducer will show vivid red. As the target gets further away from center the color will turn more yellow. You marked a single fish over a small object like a piece of brush pretty much dead center under your transducer. As you continued you picked up the edge of another part of the brushpile.

The fish on top of that pile was directly under your transducer. You went directly over the brushpile with the transducer but the 3rd fish is on the edge of the brushpile. Brushpile is located at the edge of a very slight drop off. You approached the edge of the drop off from the deeper side first.

If you have old school black and white models never fear. You can still see the same things except you have to interpet the closer to under the transducer as the images that are darker. Don't confuse this with telling hard from soft bottoms based on this criteria.

I say brushpile but at only 3' of water it may be more like a branch with a solid structure like a stump showing under the first two fish.

So what kind of fish are those?

Originally Posted by 27458

So what kind of fish are those?

Down imaging or regular 2d cant tell much in shallow water . The degree of cone angle is important . Just looking at a tiny spot in shallow water .


Understanding cone angle important


Here is a good article about cone angles