Fishfinder Tips For Halibut

[Fiskadoro]

Originally Posted by GregAndrew

I just carry a sample size spray bottle with distilled water in it and a rag. Cheap and easy.

This is probably the smartest option. Have a friend who swears by Rain-X but I've never tried it.

[ProfessorLongArms]

Originally Posted by Fiskadoro

This is probably the smartest option. Have a friend who swears by Rain-X but I've never tried it.

I thought about that, but then I googled it :-)

http://www.sonarwars.com/how-to-clea...finder-screen/

Are used to stress over it all the time when I was using my dad’s kayak with the head unit mounted just out of reach on the center console so you would have to lean forward to use it. In direct sunlight, it was almost impossible to read unless you turned so you were casting a shadow.

On my outback, I put the ball mount just within arms reach on the right-hand side in that little recess. The maneuverability of those ball mount clamps are great, and I can usually angle it so there’s no issue. +1 on the distilled water.

[Fiskadoro]

That makes sense. I've seen first hand how Rain-X makes glass more reflective. It creates a shiny surface that beads up water. My friend uses it on his Blackman, and swears by it, but his electronics are shaded under his T top.

[MITCHELL]

Originally Posted by MITCHELL

To keep salt spray off screen, then take it off when im in the zone

When I get to my truck or home I let a napkin soak up as much salt as I can get with out rubbing lens,paper napkins and salt will scratch lens. When im done with napkin or paper towel I wipe with microfiber cloth .

[alanw]

I just splash mine with a little drinking water and fish. No need to bring the household maid supplies.

[MITCHELL]

Always no where it is, to clean sunglasses, need dry rag for that at least, splashing water cool
Referring mostly cleaning graph when done fishing
I used to put whisky in there till I stopped drinking alcohol 2010

[BigTunaL]

Originally Posted by Fiskadoro

I use spinning tackle for this so I do not have to mind the rod. I just open the bail with the rod in the holder and let the iron fall. I then watch the meter and watch it sink. If the fish mark moves up before it gets to it I pick up the rod throw the bail and start reeling towards the surface as fast as I can. If the mega stops sinking I flip the bail and reel into the fish with the rod on the holder to hook up, if it passes the mark unmolested I stop it, then reel up to the level of the mark and jig it around a few times.

.

A couple of question for you:
What is a "mega"
I've read my FF manual 100 times and spent lots of time fine tuning on the water to get it to show my lure sinking but I cannot seem to find the right settings. I tried 83khz, 200khz, and both 83/200 but it didn't seem to make a difference. I also have "Jigging Mode" and tried to dial in the sensitivity but nothing worked. I was wondering if you can share your settings that allow you to see your jig and fish approaching it.

I have a Hummingbird 698 with DI and SI.

Thanks in advance

[Hunters Pa]

Originally Posted by BigTunaL

A couple of question for you:
What is a "mega"
I've read my FF manual 100 times and spent lots of time fine tuning on the water to get it to show my lure sinking but I cannot seem to find the right settings. I tried 83khz, 200khz, and both 83/200 but it didn't seem to make a difference. I also have "Jigging Mode" and tried to dial in the sensitivity but nothing worked. I was wondering if you can share your settings that allow you to see your jig and fish approaching it.

I have a Hummingbird 698 with DI and SI.

Thanks in advance

Megabait is a type of iron.

If your transducer is mounted inside your hull you may not be able to see your jig fall. Having your transducer in direct contact with the water increases the sensitivity.

[BigTunaL]

Originally Posted by Hunters Pa

Megabait is a type of iron.

If your transducer is mounted inside your hull you may not be able to see your jig fall. Having your transducer in direct contact with the water increases the sensitivity.

My transducer is in direct contact with water.

[ful-rac]

Originally Posted by BigTunaL

My transducer is in direct contact with water.

If you can't see your gear then something is definitely wrong. If you can't see your gear, you are probably not going to be able to see fish either. I would suspect you may have a bad transducer or maybe even a bad unit. So as long as your transducer is mounted correctly and it's not in demo mode.

[YakDout]

If the current or wind is stiff, you may only see your jig in the top portion of the water column. Current pushes you fast away from it and it could no longer be in your cone. When it’s real calm turn your gain up and try again. You want your gain as high as you can while not making clutter to the point where it all blends together. Every unit is different and everyone’s settings will be a little different unless you copy and paste a friends. Here are a few shots for you. Both taken within the last month. The first a few yellowtail on a friends boat. You can see my Yoyo jig dropping on the fish toward the right of the screen.

Remember the left of the screen is stuff you have already gone over, while the right side of the screen is current. Basically we saw the school come through on the meter and dropped the jig after the fact hence it’s why the jig dropping is on the right side of screen.


Second pic is a few weeks ago on my yak. This is actually a few BSB and as you can see the marks look completely different. There are many reasons for this. Settings on sonar, type of transducer, and sea bass vs a fast moving pelagic fish such as yellowtail. Black Sea bass being more of a sluggish fish will typically show as long worm marks such as the second pic. They will typically stay in your cone longer than a yellowtail would. The vertical lines in the second pic are due to a friend being in close proximity on the same frequency and the line are interference between transducers.

You can see the one BSB ascending in the second pic because I was putting some serious pressure on it right after it bit.

[YakDout]

Oh and how do I know what I’m seeing on the sonar?

[Fiskadoro]

Originally Posted by BigTunaL

A couple of question for you:
What is a "mega"
I've read my FF manual 100 times and spent lots of time fine tuning on the water to get it to show my lure sinking but I cannot seem to find the right settings. I tried 83khz, 200khz, and both 83/200 but it didn't seem to make a difference. I also have "Jigging Mode" and tried to dial in the sensitivity but nothing worked. I was wondering if you can share your settings that allow you to see your jig and fish approaching it.

I have a Hummingbird 698 with DI and SI.

Thanks in advance

Megabaits are like an iron but made out of a lead based alloy. I like them for several reasons. They are relatively small for their weight which means they have a fast sink and you can cast them a mile. They swim well at speed, but they also have a very good downward flutter, and it's one of the few jigs that I have found that tuna will hit on a unattended sink. By that I mean you can cast it out let it sink with a completely slack line and tuna will hit it going down.

That is really important to me.

When I'm out trolling for Marlin or Tuna I don't always have the time to stop and throw bait on every small paddy I find. You can troll by them but the fish around them won't always meter or come up for your jigs. What I like to do is take a Megabait on a rod with 30lb spectra up on the bow, and then cast it well ahead of the boat right next to the Kelp. While the boat closes on the paddy, I just try to keep up with the slack, and then the line goes tight when you are passing the paddy. By then bait is already down deep, I just keep reel in gear and the bait hauls ass up to the surface due the the boats forward speed, and as it does so it swings back behind the boat and right up into my trolling pattern, bringing any followers right into your jigs.

One of four things happens... most of the time nothing (dry paddy) sometimes by the time you get the slack out you are already bit (hit on the sink) sometimes the jig gets hit on the way up (hookup), or occasionally a whole school tuna follows the jig to the surface and you get multiple jig strikes (mayhem). Oddly I catch more tuna doing this then Yellows, though I have caught both throwing on paddys.

Here's a tuna I got off the East end of Catalina that hit on the sink next to a paddy where I saw a boil.

Unfortunately you can't see the Megabait because it completely swallowed it.

That day I was fishing with Steve Mras a expert small boat Marlin fisherman, so we had four big Marlin jigs trolling and a drop back rod rigged but we were not fishing for tuna. All morning Steve was laughing at me casting iron on paddies, and boiling fish, but he stopped laughing when I got that one. I was overjoyed. I also caught a 160lb Striped Marlin earlier that day, and the tuna was dinner. So a big win/win.

That fish was on a blue mackerel pattern.


Here's another on the Sardine pattern.

That fish was suspended, about a 100 feet down under a paddy. I had two strikes: one on the sink that I missed but that fish ate it coming back up. Right after that one I hooked a second one that was larger, and actually broke it off on 20lb. It ate on the sink, took off fast, when I threw the reel in gear my drag was still tight from the previous fish, and I just did not have time to react. Hate that!!!

This Ling was taken on glow back pattern I really like for deep dropping on structure.


That fish hit while I was yoyoing the jig a few feet above a structure in Malibu one of three or four big males I got that day all about the same size, all metered fish.

There are better Irons for fishing surface Yellows but for the vertical drop directly on marks the megabait is my go to lure. I know I said the jig four onces but they are really 4.5 ounces, and relatively cheap, even at melton.
http://www.meltontackle.com/products/megabait-lures.html



So your meter is probably set up wrong. I run Garmins so this might not be exactly right....but.....

Set it up at 200khz, sonar, fish ID off, I think for your finder the setting is advanced user, but the idea is to simplify by making things manual, not automatic.

The rest you want to do on the water. Launch your yak and go to about a hundred feet over clean sand. Drop your iron down to the bottom and real it up a few turns. Go to your sensitivity setting and turn up the gain until you can clearly see a line forming maybe six to ten feet off the bottom. That is your jig. Jig it up and down a few times to make sure. Now keep dialing up the sensitivity until the screen gets filled with clutter. That is your use range. Basically you want to keep the adjustment between those two settings. Try various settings on the meter, and see how you jig looks with various settings. Basically you want to run as much sensitivity as you can without metering too much junk, and as the conditions you may have to change it. There will be some areas your not going to be able to see your Iron because of the junk in the water. This is especially true around kelp. So basically the cleaner the water the better it works, but the more you play with it the easier it will be for you to tell what is going on.

Generally fish make a decent mark if you are really over them. If you can see your Iron clearly but the fish mark is weak that means the fish is not really directly under you but somewhere off to the side, but you'll figure this stuff out as you play with it more.

I also use the meter when fighting fish. For instance say You hook a big yellow. Watch him underneath you on the meter. Say you are passing over structure and he starts to sound. When he's well up you don't have to worry but if he hauls ass down right at the structure you are going to have to stop him before he gets there. I want my fish up in the top half of the water column as quickly as possible. Kelp is another issue, if you see kelp on the meter you want to keep the line moving. Moving line cuts kelp, static line wraps. If you see that your fish is around kelp don't play tug of war, you want to keep them moving.

It's just a tool. Your finder is much better then mine. Just keep it simple and play around with the settings until you find what works for you.

Good luck!!!

[BigTunaL]

Thanks YakedOut and Fiskadoro, this really helps. I appreciate you guys taking the time to write this. I can't wait to get back on the water to test new settings

[Fiskadoro]

Originally Posted by BigTunaL

Thanks YakedOut and Fiskadoro, this really helps. I appreciate you guys taking the time to write this. I can't wait to get back on the water to test new settings

No problem, glad to help, hope it works out.

[Saba Slayer]

Kevin Nakada and myself will be doing a "Dial in your Fishfinder" seminar at the Del Mar show on Saturday at 4pm on the 24th in the Hobie seminar area.
I quickly talk about installation on the Hobie's and some GPS, use then Keven really gets into the use and set-up of the sounder. We'll both have a powerpoint seminar up on the wide screen.
He is an excellent YT fisherman and his seminar can help you get your sounder adjusted to see some trophy fish especially in La Jolla.
Please stop by and sit down for a while and listen to him talk and look at some of our photos.

[BigTunaL]

I will stop by for sure. It will be a great opportunity to meet you in person.

Cheers

[Mr. NiceGuy]

Originally Posted by Saba Slayer

Kevin Nakada and myself will be doing a "Dial in your Fishfinder" seminar at the Del Mar show on Saturday at 4pm on the 24th in the Hobie seminar area.

I'll be the moist guy with lipstick sitting in the front row.

THANKS!

[Saba Slayer]

"I'll be the moist guy with lipstick sitting in the front row."

..........Security has been alerted...!!!..........LOL

[Mr. NiceGuy]

Originally Posted by Saba Slayer

..........Security has been alerted...!!!..........

Awwww, c'mon. Play nice!

As a kayak enthusiast I'm often moist, ... sometimes sopping wet.
The lipstick prevents my lips from getting chapped in the sea weather.

I'm a harmless kayak fisherman who wants to figure out this infuriating FF'ing contraption