I am looking to upgrade my fishfinder. I am spending around $300, not sure if I want color or GPS. Cant have both for that money. What is your opinion? GPS worth the extra cash for local lakes?

I use mine all the time. If I go to a lake that I have not been on before, I will mark the boat ramp so I dont have worry about land marks. I have several spots marked on the lakes I always fish. To me its worth it.

Most of us could not catch a fish anymore without a GPS. It is an invaluable tool for open water fishing. Just my opinion though. Get a graph if you can not afford both. They are even more important.

I use mine almost every trip.
I can find all my hybrid holes without gps , but using it saves a lot of time.
It is very nice on those foggy mornings.

MO

GPS is one of the best investments you'll ever make for fishing.

Mo i started to say have you ever been lost in the fog.I want go without mine

Pre gps , I left my dock early one morning heading for the
spillway which is pretty much due south, I took a heading,
and took off. Got to talking with my buddy, stopped watching
the compass. When we first saw land, we were just south
of the Horsefarm. OOPS.

Took another heading, watched the compass the whole way and
hit our target area.

Life on the water is better with a gps.


MO

You don't absolutely HAVE to have a GPS ... I can attest to having lots of good fishing days before I picked one up. But, it'll save you soooooo much time on the water pinpointing where you want to fish.

Perhaps you can get yourself a decent graph for now & then pick up an inexpensive handheld GPS in a few months?

Color vs GPS. Go with GPS everytime.

Especially if you fish at night, it's a must have.

I fish Tawakoni at night and have all my trails set so I can run 40 mph without worrying about a thing!!

Also a great tool for marking humps and spots. Finding your way back to your launch site on lakes you don't know. I know for me even the lakes I know fairly well when the lake levels change it can make it hard to locate structure your aware of because of the shoreline moving and changing shape. It has so many tools that I don't even use available as well.

I call that " Running on Faith "

I've seen too many floating logs to do that anymore.

good luck
MO

you can get a used LMS-522c igps for around 350-400 dollars.

I hired an old school guide once that didnt have a gps. We spend 5 minutes getting lined up on every spot we fished. When he didnt try to line up we would drift the spot on the wrong angle and it was a dead drift. We probably fished 15 or more spots that trip. Needless to say, he wasted hours of my time that day looking for humps and points we fished. I'll never do that again, Ive had one for years and yes they do put more fish in the boat if you use them correctly. If it only saved me 10 minutes a day it would be worth it but it really saves me much more time than that.

I use my gps a lot. I like to drift large humps, and flats, its always nice to know where I am drifting by looking at the trails.