Please pass on some tricks to judge depth when shorefishing. There are many shore fisherman who could greatly benefit from this knowledge. They could eliminate certain stretches of water within a few minutes thereby increasing their chances of catching more fish.
Thanks! 
Slip bobber and sinker. Watch your knot on the line to judge depth. I use to carry an ultra light rod, then my cat/pike rods as a kid just to check things out as I walked the shoreline! If I found the structure from the bank I was looking for, I started pitching my sinker/bobber to find out what I couldn’t see below 
Does that make any since? 
Bret
PS: At times to travel lighter, I would just carry some line and a 1oz sinker, give it a toss and try to do a count down. It worked when I was looking for depth, but not as accurate as the above!
Genereally speaking a steep shoreline indicated deeper water nearer by. In most cases you find this to be true, but it’s not always the case. The quickest way IMHO is to check the dnr and the lake maps, before you head out. On the river, you’ll be hard pressed to find maps, and even at that current can change thing over time, so really only experince tells the tale there, you may be able to see the current rising over structure (wingdams) on the river.
Hard to explain but just toss your normal rig out and of course depending how long it takes for it to hit bottom that determines your aproximate depth.
Maybe Dave can explain it better…. 
How long it takes to hit bottom and the angle of your line going into the water.
They do make a castable depth finder! I haven’t heard a lot of positive things about it though.
How about looking ahead during the winter, if you have safe ice on your water. Judge casting distance from shore and record depth through the ice either by electronic or cutting hole and line method.
The slip bobber, sinker idea is great also. Ajust the knot in 6 inch increments and you will be pretty close when the bobber finally stands up or slightly sinks.
Steve Fellegy
#49
218-678-3103
Different weights will sink at different speeds.. but you can still get a pretty good idea when casting your rig out in various places. You may not be able to get an exact depth, but you will know if you casted in one spot and it took 5 seconds to hit bottom.. and the next spot it took 2.. there is a considerable depth variation in that area. I dont count, so I cant tell you how many seconds it will take a 4 oz weight to get to depths.. but I can tell how deep once I cast there. If I had to make a guess, it will take a little over 4 seconds to sink 15′ with a 4 oz weight and a bullhead.
audemp.. the spot you take your son fishing is 15′ in the main channel.. count it down and you will know. Sinking time will vary on size of weight, and the size of your bait.
I figured an average of 3 foot per second with just the sinker on. Just wanted to see some other possible tricks that people are using out there. 
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