we were searching some timber lines for singles and double crappie post cold front and the crappie were super spooky. several times we would find and set up on a fish, and they would just vanish from the screen.
Has anyone else experienced this?
what I think is happening is that if the fish turns and swims directly away from the sonar beam, you cannot see it swimming away sometimes because the profile of the fish becomes very narrow, like a stick. couple this with a 20 degree beam, and a short forward range I think unless the fish turns left or right you wont see them.
learning all of the intricacies of livescope technology is fascinating.
something else ive noticed is that when the crappie are oriented in a vertical or diagonal position in the water column, they are in an active feeding mode. They are hovering in place, looking up and waiting for baitfish to swim over them to attack. Crappie that are near the bottom close to cover or structure (that are not moving around much) tend to be in a resting, digesting, or sleeping mode and must be kind of woken up and persuaded to bite.

They're real spooky this time of year. Often swimming off once you get inside 30' unless they're real deep! I fully believe we've made them smarter with FFS. 15' Jenko X15 is my friend this time of year!

TIMBER
They are getting so smart that they are just like a big ole fox squirrel, circling the tree on you

post frontal conditions with barometric pressure rise definitely does something to the fish. dont know if the fish are more sensitive to vibrations thru thier lateral lines, or they are hyper alert from all of the larger gamefish feeding heavily during the pre front and front event and they get chased by bigger fish . They dont seem to bunch up as much either, they are usually singles or doubles relating really close to cover and moving thru the cover.
as far as sonar frequencies affecting fish, that has already been scientifically proven.. what frequencies and at what intensity livescope technology is using is proprietary, but I imagine its alot of different frequencies , being sent thru the beams. The fish feel the push of the boat, hear the trolling motor and now get blasted with a powerful array of multi frequency sound waves. This is certainly different to them than it ever was. if it affects the fish in a negative way, what we may start to see is alot of fish hunkering down, tight to cover, that have grown very hesitant to bite during the day, and feed alot heavier at night, when all of the sonar beams go home. ha
im also wondering how baitfish are affected by the livescope beam.
This spring when the smaller baitfish gathers around cover and structure I going to take notice of if they leave the structure or stay put when the beam is pointed at a school gathered around a bridge piling or tree.

There's only a 20° cone emitted from Garmin LS..... One flick of the tail a crappie will/can be out of it..... You usually have seconds to get your jig to a crappie if you want to see the business.....

Gonna start carrying a pocket of rocks to toss in the water and spook em back to my side of the tree!! Good thinking Joe!!

I used to catch flatheads with jugs when I was younger.

When you get within 100’ of the jug and trolling motor is on 20%, the Flathead would start moving away from the boat.

The sensitivity of fish especially if they have been caught and released before is really high.

I’ve had some of my best days catching crappie (brush piles) when the wind was high and the wave action broke up your sounds.

Yeah I like to hit them in the nose with a 1/4oz jig, they bite back!!

. alot of times when the wind picks up and the boat is slapping, I back off a bit, and pitch the jig out. when the jig is in freefall on a lightly slacked line, it gives a more natural fall thru the water column than if your trying to vertical jig and the jig is yo yo ing up and down too much. I think alot of times when the wind picks up, the crappie position themselves on the calmer side of brush or timber, waiting for something to come swimming by. by pitching the jig out and letting it pendulum swing into the brush, it the fish can see it coming from a distance, more of the fish can see it coming, and it triggers more reaction strikes than just dropping the jig straight down on top of them. I usually add a little more weight to my line to try and control the direction and angle . it usually doesnt seem to matter if the jig is coming into the brush fast or slow.
even on calm days, sometimes they refuse to bite a vertical jig presentation, and the pitch out diagonal presentation gets them biting.

after doing some research. it seems to be that the closer your transducer is to the fish, the narrower the cone angle is. just like most other sonar beams. .
at 25 feet away from the transducer the coverage area of the beam is around 8 feet wide.. at 50 feet from the transducer, the coverage area is around 18 feet wide.
the beam is not like a spotlight ,,, it is more like a flashlight.
theres some vids out there of a guy who did an experiment by drilling holes in the ice of a frozen lake, and measuring out where he could see the jig,.
most transducers on other sonar set ups is either a 20 or 60 degree cone,, so if its a 60 degree cone transducer, in 20 feet of water, you will have a 20 foot wide coverage area under the boat.
before side imaging, I used to mount two fishmark 480 units on my console, with a transducer on the far left, and right side of my transom.. I had it so the 60 degree beams overlapped slightly, and I could scan around a 35 to 40 foot path of bottom in 20 feet of water.