{"id":16014,"date":"2021-11-04T12:42:52","date_gmt":"2021-11-04T11:42:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wefish.app\/?p=16014"},"modified":"2022-07-29T10:32:39","modified_gmt":"2022-07-29T08:32:39","slug":"sonar-basics-how-to-identify-fish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wefish.app\/en\/sonar-basics-how-to-identify-fish\/","title":{"rendered":"Sonar Basics: How to Identify Fish"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Sonar was developed in World War I in order to locate submarines. Why mention that in an article about fish finding? Because it illustrates an interesting point: Sonar wasn\u2019t developed to find fish<\/strong>. It was developed to find underwater objects. And every sonar device – fish finders included – is good at doing exactly that. The consequence of this is that your fish finder won\u2019t necessarily yell, \u201cThis object is a fish!\u201d (though there are some exceptions). That means you\u2019re going to need to learn how to identify which underwater objects are fish<\/strong>, and which ones aren\u2019t. In this brief guide, we\u2019ll help you do exactly that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Free<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The golden arch<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Whether you plan on making your fish into a happy meal or you\u2019re doing some catch-and-release trophy hunting, the golden rule of fish finding is the same: Fish show up as arches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To understand why<\/em> fish show up as arches, it\u2019s useful to know how a sonar works<\/strong>. The sonar is projecting sound in a cone, not in a straight line. It constantly reports back objects in that cone – even if you\u2019re stationary. The reason that fish show up as an arch isn\u2019t because that\u2019s the shape of the fish – it\u2019s because the fish is moving through the cone, so your transducer detects it at various points<\/strong>, like the side and middle of the cone.  In other words, arches mean movement<\/em>. And movement means fish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s worth noting that you won\u2019t always get a full arch – sometimes you\u2019ll only get half an arch. That\u2019s still a fish – just like a half-arch rainbow is still a rainbow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Size matters – but length doesn\u2019t<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

A consequence of this is that a long arch doesn\u2019t mean you have a big fish. A long arch means you have a fish that travelled quickly through the sonar cone<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That can be relevant, if you know the type of fish you\u2019re looking to catch moves very quickly<\/strong> (more on that later). But if you\u2019re simply looking to catch a big fish, the length of the arch doesn\u2019t matter. 
What does matter is the width<\/em> of the arch – that means the bigger an arch is vertically, the bigger the fish is. This can be a little difficult to decipher with fish that like to hang out near the bottom, but you\u2019ll get it with practice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Learning about the fish you\u2019re angling for<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

You want big fish – that\u2019s a given. But different fish have different behaviors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Catfish are a great example. As you almost certainly know, most species of catfish that are worth angling for are bottom feeders. That means you\u2019ll want to look for arches near the bottom<\/strong>. Fishfinders are great at displaying bottom hardness and structure, so this is pretty easy to get the hang of.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On that very note, some fish prefer soft bottoms<\/strong>, while other fish prefer hard bottoms. Some fish prefer certain types of structure. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

You\u2019ll also learn to spot schools of fish – when several arches are grouped together, it\u2019s almost always a school. You don\u2019t want them biting your line, but they may attract certain large fish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"fishfinder<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Play around with your fish finder<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Your fishfinder may have features that help you – well, find and identify fish. At least we hope it does. It\u2019s a fish finder, after all. We can\u2019t go over all of these features – there are too many fish finders on the market<\/strong>. We will, however, point out a couple that could be useful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first is some variation on the Fish ID system. This is a great tool for novices that some finders have<\/strong>. The arches that you\u2019re going to learn to see as fish are detected by the fish finder, and replaced with fish icons. That makes it easier to identify fish when you\u2019re just getting started.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You\u2019ll also want to test the imaging function your fish finder may have. At this point, all the best sonar fish finders<\/a> have some sort of imaging – it\u2019s becoming industry standard.   While you\u2019re not going to toggle back and forth between imaging and sonar every time, some anglers prefer having both on their screen at the same time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fish appear more clearly on Down and Side Imaging<\/strong>. You can compare the fish you see on the imaging to the fish you see on your sonar – this helps you identify which arches are fish, and how various fish behave. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, play with the sensitivity on your fishfinder. If you don\u2019t have enough sensitivity, you may not be able to find any fish<\/strong> – too much, on the other hand, and you\u2019ll have too much noise to distinguish fish from other objects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now that you\u2019ve got the knowledge you need to take full advantage of the sonar feature on your fishfinder. Happy fishing! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Descargar-WeFish-Download-WeFish\"<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sonar was developed in World War I in order to locate submarines. Why mention that in an article about fish finding? Because it illustrates an interesting point: Sonar wasn\u2019t developed to find fish. It was developed to find underwater objects. And every sonar device – fish finders included – is good at doing exactly that. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16042,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[349],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fishing-guides"],"yoast_head":"\nSonar Basics: How to Identify Fish - Wefish<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"How to identify which underwater objects are fish, and which ones aren\u2019t with a fish finder? 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