Fish Finder - how much do they help?

I’ve never used a fish finder but am considering buying one.   I keep seeing stats like fish are in 5% of the water.  If that’s true do I have to paddle 95% of the lake before I start fishing??  Anyone with an opinion is second to give me their two cents.

Thank you.

Maybe you could tell us what type of water you like to fish in and what you like to target.  I could go on about how helpful GPS enabled fish finders are on the ocean or how much down imaging technology helps finding structure when fishing for largemouth bass or the like, but I don't know how useful you would find it.

I can say that I used a model that did not have GPS for a couple seasons before I got the GPS equipped model, which was a mistake that I should not have made.

They don't help one bit, but they're a lot of fun to play with when the fish aren't biting.   

Real Answer: +1 on what crash said.

Fish finders can be extremely useful in a wide range of kayak fishing situations, and can greatly increase your success as an angler.  There are only a few kinds of kayak fishing situations where a fish finder may not be particularly useful, such as when fly fishing on a river, or when casting into lily pads for pike.

In order to provide you with suggestions about the kinds of features which you should look for in a fish finder, we need to know what kind of fishing you intend or hope to do.  For the kinds of fishing which I do, which usually involve fishing in deep water away from shore, I find that sonar, GPS, and mapping are the features which I need.  Sonar shows the depth of the water beneath your kayak, and the location of fish in the water.  GPS features allow you to return quickly and accurately to features or fish which you previously passed over while fishing.  Mapping provides you with a topographic map of the bottom, and allows you to seek out and fish around the underwater features and depths where you hope to find fish.  Down imaging provides a semi-photographic picture of the vegetation, wood, and bottom features below your kayak.  If you will do a lot of fishing in shallow water with a lot of vegetation and wood, you may find down imaging helpful, but I don't find down imaging to be at all useful for the kind of fishing which I do.  Side imaging is a kind of sonar which looks out to the sides of your kayak. It is a feature which may be useful for some kinds of fishing, but keep in mind that a side imaging transducer needs to be mounted below the keel of your kayak so it can shoot signals out to both sides of the kayak, which means that it needs to be mounted in a shield which sticks down below the keel of your kayak, or on a transducer arm which hangs over the side of your kayak, or behind the stern of your kayak. Color screens provide more information than black and white screens. 

Although I don't know what kind of fishing you hope to do, here's a general suggestion:  Buy a moderately priced fish finder with sonar and GPS features, and with a color screen.  If you buy a bottom of the line fish finder, I predict that in a couple of months you'll wish you had spent a bit more money for a more capable fish finder.  Mount the fish finder close enough to your seat so you can see the screen easily, and can operate its controls easily.  Try it out.  I think you will discover that it is extremely useful, and you will wonder how you managed to catch any fish without a fish finder.  At some point you will probably be willing to spend some extra money on a map chip for the fish finder.

There great for structure, depth, water temp, gps location, and stuff in the water columns. I have had bites with marks on the finder and had bites where I seen jackdiddlysquat....... ymmv. I have two on two of my three boats. 

same type of fishing have always done,ocean,lakes wherever and for aloooooooooong time i never used a f.f. about 5 years ago same waters started using f.f.  do they help? for me 1000% yes they help. just gps alone has saved my bacon more than once. for strictly fishing? yeah,1000%.

GPS on a finder is super useful, so are maps being able to drop waypoints to find good spots again. Can’t believe I used to fish without it. However, marking fish on sonar and then catching those fish.....well, at least I know the water depth.

I think the saying is that 90% of the fish are in 10% of the water. That is pretty much true in any given body of water. What the saying doesn't tell you is that 10% is not always the same spot. The fish finder can help you find the 10% spots faster on most days. Then you spend more time catching and less time searching.

Fish-finders are tools and you have to understand the species you're trying to catch before a fish-finder will help you find fish.

Consider the folks out there fishing the professional tournaments where the prizes reach hundreds of thousands of dollars.  They aren't zig-zagging around randomly and hoping the fish-alarm will sound.  They understand the fish.  They understand where to look.

Fish-finders are tools and you have to understand the species you're trying to catch before a fish-finder will help you find fish.

Consider the folks out there fishing the professional tournaments where the prizes reach hundreds of thousands of dollars.  They aren't zig-zagging around randomly and hoping the fish-alarm will sound.  They understand the fish.  They understand where to look.

Tinker speaks the truth.  Here are a couple of typical examples of the ways you can use a fish finder and bathymetric maps (i.e. paper or electronic underwater topo maps):

Jigging for lake trout:  On Flathead Lake in the spring, you are going to find a lot of lake trout right on the bottom in 180-230 feet of water, and you can see them better on a fish finder in flat areas.  Last Sunday we wanted to check out a new area off a point in the Big Arm area.  We headed into an area which our maps showed to be around those depths and with a fairly flat bottom and started scooting around in a search pattern, looking for lake trout, which appear as bright yellow wormlike tracks right above the bottom.  We found a bunch of them in 195-200 feet at the base of a steep drop-off, and started jigging for them, alternating between (a) a split screen sonar screen, in which one side of the screen shows the entire water column and the other side shows the bottom portion of the column in detail, and (b) a GPS screen which showed the routes we had followed while moving around and fishing, zoomed in to show a grid.  When we found a group of fish we would point our kayaks into the wind with the help of a simple wind direction indicator and pedal or paddle lightly to hold ourselves directly over the fish while jigging.  If the fish moved off, we would move around a bit until we found them again.  We caught 10 lake trout, and did a lot better than several motorboats which were fishing in the same area.  We set waypoints along the base of the drop off to help us return to the area in the future.

Downrigger trolling for kokanee.  In the Helena Regulating Reservoir, you are most likely to find kokanee suspended in the middle of the water column between 25 and 35 feet down in certain parts of the lake.  So I set my fish finder to a split screen with GPS on one side and sonar on the other, and troll through those areas looking for kokanee, which hang out in schools and jitter up and down a few feet, creating a distinctive sonar return.  The sonar shows the depth that my downrigger weight and lure are running.  If I am trolling at 30 feet down and a come across a school of kokanee at 45 feet down, I drop my downrigger weight down to the depth of the school and start trolling through the area in figure eight or cloverleaf patterns to pin down the location of the school, with the help of the GPS screen, which shows the track which I have followed while trolling.  I work the school until the school disperses, and then troll around the area looking for other schools of kokanee, adjusting the depth of my downrigger weight and lure in response to the depth of the fish which I find.  If I catch a kokanee and the wind blows me away from the school while I'm playing it in, netting it, and putting it in my cooler, I can return right to the school with the help of the GPS screen.

You use a fish finder somewhat differently for each kind of fish, but this should give you an idea of how you can use a fish finder.

I pretty much feel naked when fishing without my sonar anymore.

I love knowing my depth and seeing the occasional fish arch fills me with hope.  Is it a necessity?  In most cases, No, but it does give you a tangible advantage...  Unless you're Jed, and then it's just something that gets in the way of outfishing people around him.  The Bastard!


-Mark-

My fishfinder has saved my mirage drive many times when shallow water snuck up on me.  I love it for finding schools of kokanee. Also for seeing the bottom structure.  I also wouldn't waste my money on a unit without GPS. The price difference just doesn't make sense.

Last year I bought the Dragonfly 4 Pro.  Navonics, GPS, Down Imaging, plus a few other bells and whistles that I thought might be useful for my purposes...  The GPS and knowing the structure under me was worth every penny.  I don't do a lot of lake fishing so I cannot comment on their use in lakes.  The structure in the Ocean can change a lot very quickly and I find the FF helps to keep me in the target zone I want to be.

People have been catching fish without them for many thousands of years.  Do you need one, NO.  Do they help, YES.

I'm not sure a ff has helped me catch more fish but I'm sure it has helped me lose less gear by knowing the depth when trolling. Also, noting depth changes when trolling is useful if you are trying to be near the bottom like trolling in some of our estuaries for salmon, for example. Spotting ledges and structure when you are jigging, also good to know. Spotting actual fish is exciting but usually doesn't mean you are going to catch the ones you see.