Side Imaging?

I've learned allot this year about catching whites, striper & hybrids! I have learned allot from LLA, forum members, and just time on the water. I just purchased a side scan unit and I am wondering what you guys look for on the side imaging before deploying the trolling motor, or anchoring up. I've been on several trips with LLA, but didn't own a side image unit then, and really didn't know what I was looking at. Do you look for large schools, few fish, bait & fish? What makes you turn the outboard off, grab a rod & start fishing? It would be great to see some pics & info...

Thanks Guys!!!

http://texasfishingforum.com/forums/ubbt...ds#Post10098033

I'd like to see this discussed more, also. I've been putting off buying a side imaging because I just don't see what I'm looking for on the graphs I have seen.

The DI picture on Lenahorns reference is apparently a one in a million shot. I have never seen one that looks that good on my Bird 598. I've fished with several of my friends that have side imaging and I'm just not convinced. I guess what I'm saying is I have never seen any live shots that look like the ones that Bird and Lowrance use for their advertising. If I did, I'd have one.

We were at Tawakoni about a month ago I got these, it was a 100+ fish day for us.
http://texasfishingforum.com/forums/ubbt...ew#Post10086997

I fished this weekend and had an epic day, but I feel that I got lucky...

I looked all morning for fish on the side imaging, but struck out At my last stop for the day, I stopped to grab the drift sock, turned on the 2D sonar and it was loaded with fish! I anchored up and started nailing them! I almost went home empty handed, but feel that luck saved the day. Here is my sonar shot of the hybrids. We caught over 100 fish!

Having trouble uploading pics for some reason? It will not upload after several minutes. I even resized to 119kb

Side imaging has not changed the way I fish but it has greatly improved how successfully I do. Probably the most useful tool I have ever used to locate fish in open water, structure (timber) and relating to bottom structure. You can cover so much more water in such a short period of time. The key is learning to identify fish with it, once you convince yourself that most all of those little white popcorn specs, checks, cottony puffs, lines, and squiggles are actually fish. You will find yourself only fishing where the fish are and being able to stay on them because they cant move from below you without you knowing what way they went. Just my 2 cents on it.

Well said. I do not have one, but in the hands of someone that knows what their doing, it is awesome. I've seen it 1st hand. Still have to know where to look.

I find the most useful part about structure scan is finding structure (duh). I recommend getting hte biggest screen you can afford, with my hds8 i like to divide the screen into 4 parts: chart, 2d traditional scan, downscan and structure scan. I've found that with the structure scan you can find all sorts of stuff: sunken boats, road-beds, stumps, trees, rocks etc etc, but I rely more on the 2d traditional scan and downscan for locating the fish. One of the coolest features is being able to find a certain piece of structure or school of fish, put your pointer on it and create a waypoint that precisely pin-points where that is so you can go back and get right on top of it or cast right at it.

I run my 2D and side imaging at the same time. I put my Side Imaging at 150 on the right and 150 on the left and when your scanning I look for schools of fish and bait. You can see the fish way out from the boat and that's when you drop the ipilot and call them in and catch some fish. You have to have your settings right though as far as using the sharpness settings. Works best in deeper waters of course..

With the sonar we have today you can almost call it out when your about to catch a fish its CRAZY!

I could write an essay on side scan and honestly it wouldn't be any use to anyone but me, lol. You can pay for a sonar trip as well, but I don't know if it would help in a few short hours. I have set up several and it seems they all have to be tweaked a little differently. The best advise I know it's to get on schooling fish and sacrifice a great day off fishing. When you get into a large school of fish its the best time to adjust your graph and get those great images you see posted here. Then don't change it. That will be what you look for the rest of the time you fish. There may not be as many as when they were schooling, but you will be able to tell what fish look like and go from there. From then on it is just hours on the water and time and experience with your graph.

No stripers in this lake but LOTS of shad:









Sometimes you see them being chased:

While we are talking about sonar I thought i would share a few Screenshots I took Sunday when Tommy and i were Slaying the Hybrids and whites on Belton.

In the pic below you can see the Hybrids and whites stacked up feeding. At one point we had 4 fish on! On 4 different rods!
If you look close you can see the different size fish.. Hybrids vs Whites.



And another



Here you see a full screen image of Hybrids and whites all over the place!



Here is a pic of two of the hybrids we kept.



Any questions?

This is exactly what we did to mine the last time we really got on fish. My question is there a way to lock settings on Lowrance?