To See or Not To See... that is the question

not sure if you guys have had this discussion on another post, but here goes:


I have fished from a power-boat for many-a-years and one of my favorite species was salmon. During all my excursionings chasing down this delicous creation, I have never seen them appear on my fishfinder. I was taught that you find the bait, you find the fish; so I always  looked for bait. but I have never saw marks on the screen before I've gotten a strike.

So... Do Salmon really show up on Fishfinders/sonars? or because the have no air bladder, they don' show up....

Yes they show up and they do have swim bladders.

Many years on my Dad's powerboats trolling for salmon and we never relied on what we were seeing on the TV - other than depth and obvious bait balls.

I've trolled for salmon with a fishfinder on my yak quite a bit in the past 2.5 years.  In my experience they're not seen much at all, but sometimes I have made marks and also caught salmon at that depth, so they gotta be hanging out and detectable at times, I'd say.  I think salmon and maybe some other highly mobile species (WSB?) are very elusive as far as being seen on our electronics, and that's definitely one of the things that makes pursuing them more fun.    

I've had people question while trolling off of Shelter Cove, "if we're not seeing anything on our fishfinder then the salmon aren't here, right?!"  It's not that simple.  These fish are on the move and aren't dumb.  I like my fishfinder for depth, and I definitely pay attention to marks I see, but I don't count on it showing me salmon.

http://www.norcalkayakanglers.com/index.php/topic,4264.msg34543.html#msg34543

http://www.norcalkayakanglers.com/index.php/topic,6564.0.html

http://www.norcalkayakanglers.com/index.php/topic,1179.msg8391.html#msg8391

summary - they show up fine in the rivers/delta, in the ocean not quiet as easily.

....they show up fine in the rivers/delta, in the ocean not quiet as easily.

Then the marks I saw while on the AR were probably Salmon..... they showed up in spurtz... wasn't sure if they were salmon, stripers or carp..... but with most marks on the bottom, there were most likely salmon....

I marked fish in the American but on the ocean I dont see them either. Bait yes, I was possibly marking suspended salmon at Paradise on PT Chauncey last week or stripers.

....they show up fine in the rivers/delta, in the ocean not quiet as easily.

Then the marks I saw while on the AR were probably Salmon..... they showed up in spurtz... wasn't sure if they were salmon, stripers or carp..... but with most marks on the bottom, there were most likely salmon....

Not trying to get super technical but on the AR (rivers and lakes) you need to play with the noise filter...I mark Salmon all the time in the river; they're easier to mark when you're floating downstream than upstream...a lot guys will pass up good areas because they don't mark Salmon on the graph but when you stop paddling, you'll see them appear on the graph...