imbatman

I guess I should have tagged this into an existing thread.... my bad, Ill get the hang of it.

LOL Tlauz, I like the winter but not hard water, we catch some good fish here in the winter. I 100% agree on fishing over watching.

Sorry for the long winded reply... I am from 2 levels on this. I am an I.T. geek so I like the tech. I do enjoy looking at a screen and trying to decipher the environment under water. There is no doubt for me the electronics have helped especially with off shore fishing. In a shallow lake like Okeechobee that was ref'd the electronics are all but useless except water temp. That is a big shallow bath tube. When I am fishing that shallow in the spring I will actually cut off the sonar especially on a highly pressured lake. I do not think fish can think but I do think they can get conditioned to certain things kinda like a mouse in a maze. They go the wrong way enough, get shocked, and they get conditioned not to go that way anymore. I think the same thing applies to bigger bass when shallow. For years they heard out little pinging, see something to eat and then have their face jerked off. After a while I really believe some bass just stop eating when they hear our "pings". One thing I know for sure, that the new tech helps me manage my fishing day. Almost all of us have a few spots in our favorite lakes where we run the same bank or weedline every visit or the same point/ledge. -Setting the a route on the weedline/bank saves me time and keeps me disciplined. I have a hard time moving along at times and it solves that. As I catch fish on that route I mark a waypoint. After some time you will see a pattern about your catches and their locations. Once you see that you can fish the good spots and then move on to newer/diff water. -SpotLock is just one of the best pieces of tech ever for the offshore angler. I fish a lot of ledges and points in the summer and our lakes have a lot of recreational traffic. IT is darn near impossible to effectively fish a ledge or a point trying to manually manage a trolling motor/boat position. -Side imaging is 100% worth it to me for one thing, ROCK PILES!! . One thing you can see on SI without being a wizard is hard bottom/rocks. More than once I have been idling along and see something 80 feet to the right or left I was not even looking for because hard bottom and rock is such a bright return and if you find some rock or a hard bottom in a veggie lake you have found fish. Now most all of these features help way more off shore than the shallow water fisherman. For some like Tommy Biffle who is always shallow it seems all he needs is a paper map and a water temp gauge. I did it one the cheap... or as best I could. I bought a couple of used HBird units, an 898 and a 998 for $600 bucks and are still really good tools and can be nearly as good as the newer stuff just harder to tune (or that is what I have found). I did not go with an Ultrex even though I wanted one really bad. I got a MK ipilot powerdrive (about 30-40% less the $ of an ultrex). It is not a link model but will save 25 tracks in the Tmotor itself which will work fine. So there is my 2 cents on the new tech.

Another thing that may help in a hot lake is trying to find the thermocline. Fishing here in the southeast in the late summer the top level of the water column will get warm but at some point (10-20 feet typically) there will be a thermocline where the lower water column is cooler below that top layer. Bass tend to find cover in these situations that is just above the thermocline as it has the most dissolved oxygen. Below the thermocline there is not as much oxygen so it can give you a really good depth to start at. If the thermocline is 15ft the I fish cover and baits at 12-14feet.

You guys fishing or watching today? Unfortunately I will be watching and trying to get the boat done and ready for fishing soon! Next MLF stop is local and I hope to go watch a little (but I will not be one of the guys crowding the fisherman!).

Beautiful area of the state you are in!!!

Nice job!!! Thank you!!!

Generally fish will be a brighter return than vegetation as they are much denser and will have a better return. They look like dashes as much as anything. Check this out. Dr Sonar has some good info and great pics of fish on side imaging. https://doctorsonar.com/blogs/educational-articles/side-scan-fish

That is odd that it would run then stop and say that. It is a function of the unit but you should have to "stop" it via the menu (sonar menu if I remember right). Some folks have so many units they get cross talk and this will eliminate that by stopping a/the unit from "pinging" from its ducer. The other "Stop" function is if you are logging sonar data. This is also in the menu. I have seen issues with a few of the lowrance buttons getting stuck so the unit thinks it is always depressed and does unexpected things. I would go thru and set the unit back to default (system menu) and see if it still does it. If so then see if you can tell if you have a button "stuck" I think the "X" button will stop the sonar also so maybe check that button (rock it back and forth with your finger tip and see if you feel anything).

Hi... Newbie here but not to Gaston or the area. I live in NC just east of Ral so I am about an hour away from Gaston and fish there a lot. There is not much up there right around the lake. There are some businesses but it is somewhat rural. Really the closest major city is probably Raleigh. If it were me I would look anywhere Raleigh and north. There is a lot of industrial type stuff along US 1 from Va to Raleigh as well as along I85 that I would believe would have to have some mechanical positions. The Raleigh / Durham grows like crazy and is really not a bad drive to Gaston or Kerr and there are plenty right here in Raleigh/Durham. Gaston can be a zoo on the weekends in the summer...fyi. It is a popular lake with a lot of big $ houses on it. Nearby Kerr is great also and maybe not as crowded. It is really a nice place to live.

I fish in and around Raleigh. Mostly At Jordan, Falls, and Harris (lucky as heck to live near these lakes). Been fishing all my life as something my dad introduced me to. Thanks Pops!!! -Mark

Do you see any type of bait at all? I doubt a pond that size has much of a shad population so I bet bluegill and crayfish are their main foods and bass hate bluegill around the spawn and will pursue them for meanness right now. I have found bass in those smaller lakes get very keyed into the natural forage. In a lake that size I have to believe your are putting your bait in front of fish so maybe it is more about the right bait. Small juigs in "craw" color if the bottom is not all mucked up or maybe a dropshot with a small bluegill colored (maybe junebug) trick worm.