MY FAVOURITE FISHING FRIEND!
Brian Dygdala, Saskatoon
Of all the items I take fishing with me in the boat, the most important item and my favourite fishing friend is - my Lowrance sonar unit. It should be your best friend as well!
All I need is my Lowrance HDS 12 Gen 3 sonar unit. I see the lake bottom and anything suspended above it on a 12” colour screen. I can see the screen from everywhere in my 20’ boat.
With advanced sonar features such as Side Imaging I can tell if fish are off the left or right side of the boat which allows me to adjust where I’m fishing and focus on varying my lures, depth, and retrieve rather than trying to find fish.
The touch screen allows me to use the unit like I would a smartphone, maneuvering around the menu is simple and quick.
When I’m on the clock in a Fishing Tournament…I can set the time to appear on the screen. Water Temperature, Battery Voltage and Speed are other features I like to have show up on the screen, just so I know in better detail what’s going on.
The GPS on my HDS Gen 3 sonar allows me to use waypoints to save things like my best fishing spots, the weigh-in, the boat launch, rock piles or any areas that I have been to previously.
Waypoints will always be stored on the unit, so the next trip out will be easy with my hot spots marked and named so they are easily identified.
Trails are just important as Waypoints. They allow me to follow some of my successful trolling patterns. When I have success trolling a certain break line or drop off, I simply save that trail for the next time I’m out. Or I can follow my Trail back to the boat launch when I fish late at night or during heavy rain or fog. I can even colour each trail individually so that I can tell them apart when I repeat them on different days.
When I turn on the Navionics map in my unit I can maneuver around all the islands and points that look alike just to make sure I'm headed in the right direction. I can even create my own depth maps with Sonar Chart Live. I simply drive my boat around the area I want to fish and the depth maps will show up instantly as I move.
My HDS unit when teamed with a Vexilar Fishphone underwater camera will allow me to use the 12” screen to view whatever is on the the bottom. The screen is better and bigger than most portable underwater cameras and it allows me to view everything on one big screen.
So as you can see by all these features it’s tough for me to head out fishing on the boat without my favourite fishing friend!