Reading Bottom

If you are fishing hard bottom, will your flasher show a thicker line or a thinner one? I always thought it was the thinner but I’m not too sure and I’ve heard different answers from different people for some reason.

Thinner,a soft bottom absorbs the signal,making the bottom larger. A harder bottom has more signal reflection,thinner bottom line.I hope I am right??? Paul

I have always went by color. If its an inch or so of red then its a hard bottom, if its a tiny bit of red then yellow or orange then its a soft bottom. Don’t know where I’ve heard that, but thats the way I’ve always thought it to be.

I have always been under the impression that the harder the bottom the bigger the line. A soft bottom will absorb the signal so your return will not be as good. You may even get an orange lor green line depending on if there are weeds over the bottom. The harder the bottom the stronger the return and the thicker the line. Hope this helps. Tight lines mate!

Bottom density = Line Intensity. Its not really a matter of how think the line is, because how much you have you gain jacked up will skew that. Its how intense the line is bounced back. Just like the difference of a line from a fish at the outer edges of the signal cone Vs. dead center of the cone (provided that your transducer is sitting level in the hole)

I read that if you have a double echo or the bottom reads twice you have a hard bottom…For instance if your fishing 15FOW and you put it on your 40ft setting (because at 20ft setting there isn’t enough screen to show the 2nd bottom) and you see a 2nd bottom line on the left side of the screen its a hard bottom…Anybody know if this is true??To me it makes sense

I’ve heard the second bottom theory. Sort of like the second bottom on my 597cihddi humminbird?