Fish Finder For A Shallow River/creek

[FishnMan]

Hello all, I have a Wilderness Systems Tarpon 120 Kayak that I use regularly for fishing a nearby creek ("Elkhorn Creek") here in Georgetown Kentucky. It has a wide array of depths, but mostly shallow ranging anywhere from 2-14ft. Not real sure if it is actually worth installing a fish finder on my kayak or not.

If I do decide to get one, then I am going to use the Mad Frog sidetable with the transducer arm, but am not sure about a fishfnder.

Here are my worries, 1)how well do fishfinders work with shallow water

2) how deep does the water need to be? 3)how far around me does it show fish, or does it only show what is directly below me?

I have never used a fish finder before, I have. Lot of friends with bass boats that have them and use them, however, I never go out on a lake, only the Elkhorn.

I have been very successful here lately fishing holes that I have found over time, but there are a lot of places that I would like to venture out to in order to find some more honey holes that are less trafficked by mini 2man pontoons or waders.

Any info that you could shine my way would be greatly appreciated. Thanks a bunch!

[Wayne P.]

Hello all, I have a Wilderness Systems Tarpon 120 Kayak that I use regularly for fishing a nearby creek ("Elkhorn Creek") here in Georgetown Kentucky. It has a wide array of depths, but mostly shallow ranging anywhere from 2-14ft. Not real sure if it is actually worth installing a fish finder on my kayak or not.

If I do decide to get one, then I am going to use the Mad Frog sidetable with the transducer arm, but am not sure about a fishfnder.

Here are my worries, 1)how well do fishfinders work with shallow water

2) how deep does the water need to be? 3)how far around me does it show fish, or does it only show what is directly below me?

I have never used a fish finder before, I have. Lot of friends with bass boats that have them and use them, however, I never go out on a lake, only the Elkhorn.

I have been very successful here lately fishing holes that I have found over time, but there are a lot of places that I would like to venture out to in order to find some more honey holes that are less trafficked by mini 2man pontoons or waders.

Any info that you could shine my way would be greatly appreciated. Thanks a bunch!

A regular sonar unit will not show what is around you unless you are in very deep water. The sonar pulse is a cone shape and the area it covers is about 1/3 the depth.

If you what to know what is away from you, the Imaging technology will do that.

This screen shot is from Humminbird Side Imaging unit. I was fishing a creek channel (the dark band on the right side) that had a school of shad in it and bass were chasing them (the white streaks). Note the depth. The boat position is the centerline and the transducer is showing to the right and left at the set range (at the top).

[Packard]

Hey, I am a Kayak Fisherman myself and think I can help you out. I have an Ocean Kayak Prowler Trident 13. My fishfinder is a Humminbird PiranhaMAX 170. I fish no deeper than 20 ft of water and it's not going to necessarily show you fish but will show you the bottom contour and structure that will hold fish and will help you to decide which technique to use. If you do get a fishfinder make sure to take it off fish id mode which will show cartoon fish but most likely they aren't fish. It can be used at any depth you want but in real shallow water you can look at the bottom. My fishfinder doesn't catch the fish for me but for $100 it sure does help. Here is a link to a video of my kayak all rigged up if you want to see.

[LargeChuckles]

I would not bother for elkhorn creek. If you want to "probe" deep holes a heavy jig or dropshot will work well. Good thing about both of those it will transmit bottom type (bedrock, gravel, mud, etc) Been awhile since fishing there, but I don't recall anything over 12-15 ft feet deep.