Not marking fish on sounder

vangoalie

Active Member
Pretty new to fishing and trying to get my equipment figured out. Was out at the sandheads this weekend and 7-1 on Saturday morning, got skunked, saw a few boats pulling nets but not many, we got on undersized coho. My question is my sounder sometimes marked fish in the 160-200 range near the bottom but rarely ever marked anything in the top water column where most people have been catching. if I traveled over someones downrigger ball I would seem to mark that. Someone told me they never mark fish there and just target the sweet spot at the time. Anyone have any insight into this, I currently own a Humminbird 788cihd that I am looking to upgrade, always losing bottom and i have to change the setting on the transducer to get bottom back good for a 1/2 hour then lost again, frustrating. Thinking of a Simrad go combo unit , any thought on this sounder? Thanks for everyones help.
 
Just a general observation here but I found that my Humminbird (Helix 5) did fine in freshwater but really struggled in salt water. It may have something to do with the density of salt water vs fresh water and the frequencies of the transducer. When I upgraded electronics, I started working backwards by figuring out which transducer would best suit my style of fishing (and budget) and then seeing what head units were compatible. For my last 2 units, I have been using an Airmar P66 (there are other options but for the money, this one has been getting the job done locally for a long time) and a Lowrance Elite ti (first a 7 inch and now a 9 inch Ti2).
I don't always mark fish but that could also be that they're simply not within my cone. Hasn't stopped me from getting into fish though and most times, I don't see anything on my sounder when my rod gets hit.
 
Pretty new to fishing and trying to get my equipment figured out. Was out at the sandheads this weekend and 7-1 on Saturday morning, got skunked, saw a few boats pulling nets but not many, we got on undersized coho. My question is my sounder sometimes marked fish in the 160-200 range near the bottom but rarely ever marked anything in the top water column where most people have been catching. if I traveled over someones downrigger ball I would seem to mark that. Someone told me they never mark fish there and just target the sweet spot at the time. Anyone have any insight into this, I currently own a Humminbird 788cihd that I am looking to upgrade, always losing bottom and i have to change the setting on the transducer to get bottom back good for a 1/2 hour then lost again, frustrating. Thinking of a Simrad go combo unit , any thought on this sounder? Thanks for everyones help.

I run a humminbird 787c2i, its critical that you make sure your settings are setup properly for salt. You have to go into and change the settings to advanced then set the sonar settings and change it to saltwater and not freshwater, also make sure you dont use AUTO RANGE!!! biggest mistake by most using humminbird units is not actually zoning in the depth your actually fishing and setting the max depth to the max youll actually be fishing because the rest doesnt mean jack all!!! It will also interfere with markings of fish etc.
 
I run a humminbird 787c2i, its critical that you make sure your settings are setup properly for salt. You have to go into and change the settings to advanced then set the sonar settings and change it to saltwater and not freshwater, also make sure you dont use AUTO RANGE!!! biggest mistake by most using humminbird units is not actually zoning in the depth your actually fishing and setting the max depth to the max youll actually be fishing because the rest doesnt mean jack all!!! It will also interfere with markings of fish etc.

That is the one I have as well and I have issues with it. Can you post what your setting on hummingbird that you found work best? I have a simrad that I can put a better transducer on but I use it for GPS only.
 
I have the same unit and used to have the same issues. I did some research and found you need to update the firmware. once i did that it runs much more smoothly and doesnt lose bottom while trolling anymore. My dad has the 688 on his boat and had the same problem until we updated firmware. you go to humminbirds website and download the update onto an sd card then load it into your unit. hope this helps
 
I have the same unit and used to have the same issues. I did some research and found you need to update the firmware. once i did that it runs much more smoothly and doesnt lose bottom while trolling anymore. My dad has the 688 on his boat and had the same problem until we updated firmware. you go to humminbirds website and download the update onto an sd card then load it into your unit. hope this helps

the update to the head unit is key but ill try to grab some snap shots for you guys to set it up. On youtube there is some vids as well :)
 
Great info thanks kingblazer, I also set the unit to saltwater deep, I had just left the unit on auto before. I just upgraded the firmware from 5.67 to 7.68, hope that helps, going to try it out this weekend. The unit has also been struggling with the GPS bouncing around a lot hoping the firmware helps there too. I was going to pick up a Lowrance 7 ti but if this fixes mine I am golden! Any other info on setting kingblazer would be appreciated. Thanks again!
 
I bought a Garmin in 2015 from Gil Travis (Semperfifishing). Gil is a former DOD SONAR specialist. At that time, Gil said Lowrance is good for freshwater but Garmin/Furuno are better for saltwater; especially CHIRP which involves software signal processing.

I believe Garmin is price competitive with Hummingbird/Lowrance, has lot's of choice & the detailed Bathymetric charts are at least equal to any other.

Gil is very active on THT (The HullTruth) forums & has in general the best prices.

I believe Salmon are a bit difficult to mark; I'd be sure to get a high frequency CHIRP transducer which would be great down to 300-400 feet.
 
Sorry another question, did firmware upgrade help with marking fish and the GPS too? Thanks!

seems to have helped as well. I mean dont get me wrong the newer tech out there is better for sure BUT might as well run what your brung! lol make it last for as long as possible and save the $$$ for boat gas and vacay to catch some fish instead! imo haha
 
In freshwater I have seen fish marked in shallow water on my little portable hummingbird and then caught them (trout and walleyes). In salt water (I have an older Lowrance 5x ) I think that I identify bait quite consistently (although there is some noise from tidal currents I think), the bottom is very reliable compared with expected depth from my GPS, but I am never sure about fish and I can't say I have ever marked a fish then caught it. I do get fish moderately often targeting bait on my sounder.
 
seems to have helped as well. I mean dont get me wrong the newer tech out there is better for sure BUT might as well run what your brung! lol make it last for as long as possible and save the $$$ for boat gas and vacay to catch some fish instead! imo haha

Yes totally agree with that, but man it would be nice to have one of the new ones, just having a hard time parting with $1000 for a lower end 7" new one!! And if mine is working no need, my boat is worth $10000 hard to spend 10% on electronics! Prefer to have mine work and stay with it. I do like it and it is easy to use!
 
Yes totally agree with that, but man it would be nice to have one of the new ones, just having a hard time parting with $1000 for a lower end 7" new one!! And if mine is working no need, my boat is worth $10000 hard to spend 10% on electronics! Prefer to have mine work and stay with it. I do like it and it is easy to use!

well at the end of the day if you dont end up wanting it anymore lemme know I may be interested just as a spare head unit for my boat.
 
So 2 things to see salmon better:

1. Use the lowest frequency your transducer supports. Transducer frequencies operate at different cone angles. Generally, the higher the frequency the narrower the cone. A 200khz freq. has a 6 degree cone angle whereas a 50khz freq has a 20 degree cone angle. The smallest part of the cone starts at the boat and flares out according to that angle. With a 200khz frq, unless a fish is directly under the boat or even down to 60 feet, you won’t see it. Whereas a 50khz will return good marks at 20 feet or greater. Most finders today ship with multi freq. transducers and always default to the higher one.

2. Use chirp if your unit supports it. Chirp uses multiple frequencies / multiple cone angles to derive the signal. Chirp always returns stronger/better signals.
 
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