Shore Based Fish Finder

[manitoubass2]

(02-27-2012 11:01 PM)MichaelAngelo Wrote:  

(02-27-2012 10:56 PM)manitoubass2 Wrote:  Anytime I'm fishing new water from shore, a 3/8oz jig is my go to so I can fan out casts and make a mental note of the depth and structure. Braids helps tremendously for that as well.

You do this by timing how long the jig takes to hit the bottom? How would braided lines help for this?

Basically, yep.

Braided line is very sensitive and gives me a great idea of the bottom structure and whether its grass, mud, rock etc. It takes a little work, but experience will tell you exactly what the bottom is, and you can find transitions etc all by feel.

a 3/8 oz jig falls roughly 1ft per second in moderate current.

One spot I fish from shore, I also fish from the boat. The first time I did a few passes with the fishfinder and I already new what it was gonna look like. I even knew where brush piles had rested and a few cinder blocks etc, lol. But it confirmed the depth to be exactly 23ft, precisely what I had figured by casting out a jig...

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I should mention that if your using mono, it will fall a tad faster. If you count 23, then it probably about 21ft. Braided line floats, and has a slightly longer time to reach bottom. Fluorocarbon also sinks, and is similar to mono.