Humminbird Side, Down Imaging through the ice

Between fish on our Hayward Lakes weekend, I did a little field work with my Humminbird 1197c, to see how Side Imaging and Down Imaging performed in a hard-water setting. I focused on one particular area that I had imaged extensively during open water. One of those open water side images is shown below. It is a near-shore area with a distinct inner weed edge (green line), timber between the shore and the inner edge, and then a bed of cabbage and coontail that extends from the inner edge at ~ 4 ft to an outer edge of ~ 12.

Now, since the transducer isn’t moving, the image doesn’t have that familiar appearance. Nevertheless, there is information to be had. Here’s a 3-way split screen capture from the area between the shoreline and the inner weed edge.

In this particular spot, the Side Image is useful. It shows both the shoreline and the distinct inner weed edge. Since the GPS was hooked up, I could easily determine the distance from the GPS puck (by the hole) to the inner edge if I wanted to target that particular area for predators at prime time.

Here’s a look at a deeper portion of the weedbed. A little camera work confirmed that the weeds in this area were laying down, a mixture of healthy green cabbage and dying/dead coontail and other weeds.

The DI and 2D views are instructive here.

The 2D view (recorded with 200/83 kz dual beam) shows the dead/dying weeds as the blue signal above the yellow bottom. My tip-up bait and weight are visible as solid blue lines above the weeds.

The DI view shows that the weeds are not a solid carpet, but rather occur in patches (I was moving the ‘ducer back and forth in the hole). Recall that the SI/DI beams are razor thin, and sample a small slice of water, while the 2D cones sample ALL of the water simultaneously and therefore display an average of all objects within the beam.

I have been thinking about this on hard-water for quite some time. I wonder if building a tripod with a motor that would rotate 180 degrees at a certain speed would give you very good images. I suppose you could try this without a motor but just a tripod. I know the images would probably be more pie-shaped, but just a thought.

I think a 798ci (internal GPS) unit would be a nice way to do this. It would be a bit more convenient and portable than the system I rigged up.

WarrenMN, one of the original contributors to Side Imaging on this site did this a few years back:

http://www.accuemap.com/Ice_fishing_with_Humminbird_997.html

Jason,

have you ran any of the HB’s with the internal GPS? Wondering about their GPS performance. Accuracy and how quickly they lock in.

Thanks,

FDR

Quote:

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WarrenMN, one of the original contributors to Side Imaging on this site did this a few years back:

http://www.accuemap.com/Ice_fishing_with_Humminbird_997.html

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Necessity is the mother of invention. Then mental and physical effort we fishermen put into our sport never ceases to amaze me. Neat idea