Flashers?

[Fat Boy]

Regarding fish size, you can't really tell the different sizes of panfish too much, but when a big bass, walleye or pike shows up the mark it gives is much bigger.  Sometimes baitfish look like the marks of a panfish too but they tend to dissappear and reappear.

Marking suspended trout is tough unless you get lucky or have a large school of them (at least rainbow and brook trout on the waters that I fish).  Usually, they show up out of nowhere at any depth in response to a lure that I'm jigging.  If I know that there are trout in a lake I'll experiment sometimes by agressively jigging my lure at different depths, but not for a long time.  If I continually show marks at a certain depth, then later when I've fished a hole out of panfish I'll jig that depth before I leave.  If I'm jigging panfish within the bottom 5 feet and a mark appears above me, it's usually a trout or a crappie (not always, sometimes they can be gills, bass or perch).  The funny thing is that I've always heard that suspended fish are hard to catch (TV, magazines, etc.), but in experiences ice fishing with a flasher, when I mark a suspended fish I am very confident that it will bite.  Suspended fish seem more aggressive than ones on the bottom...

One other thing, Alpine is right, the flasher is a tool and doesn't catch fish.  It's how we use it that make us better fishermen even over 10' of water.  There have been times that a flasher was useless.  The first time that I've experienced this was on Hunters Lake in PA.  2 years ago they stocked a lot of big brookies and rainbows and everyone was catching them.  My buddy and I were jigging over 12' of water catching a trout every now and then and lots of little perch while we noticed everyone fishing along the shorelines.  Thinking that they were on to something, we cut holes along the shoreline.  I thought that maybe they were on some sort of steep dropoff but everywhere I cut holes it was only 2 to 3' deep.  That was where the trout were feeding the most though.  So, we found some shoreline structure and features (incoming stream) and really started nailing them.  We'd jig looking down the hole seeing our lure and the bottom and no fish when, all of a sudden, a big brookie would streak by and seize the lure, taking line with it.  We caught trout after trout and my flasher stayed in my sled - didn't have to charge it for the next trip!!!

Oh yeah, Exudedude and Hard_H20 are exactly right.  I always fish above them and tease them up.  I never could understand why anyone would buy a flasher just to see their lure on the bottom and not see the fish separate.  How would you know their mood and what do you look at in that case?  If you are looking at your flasher and you get a bite, then you are going to miss it.  If you're looking at your rod tip and not the flasher without knowing for sure a fish is there then what good is the flasher.  I see a lot of guys with new flashers or borrowing mine do that and I'm always trying to coach them to fish up.

[fishinnutinwis]

luv my vex-18...need to get that update tho--hate idea of sending it in and being without for a week or so..

[orangebucket]

I noticed that bigger fish in sallower water with the gain down, looks like 2 fish. I can usually tell the differance between bait, panfish, and larger fish most of the time. It seems tricky sometimes my flasher usally marks them all big when they are directaly under the cone, so I go by how many lighter colored lines that are on the mark. Also depending on how many fish are actually sitting there stacked. Just have to learn your unit from experance and know how to use your gain.

[Jam_Jam]

I just got back from fishing for suspende Rainbows in 100' of water and I had absolutely had no problem marking suspended fish with the FL18.  It was a tremendous help in nailing down exactly where the fish were.  Of course it is only a tool but it like any tool if you learn to use it properly it WILL Definitely help catch more fish.  I can guarantee I caught more fish this weekend because of it.  I'd be fishing at 25' then a mark would show at 40' or 60'...I'd just drop my line immediately and boom I'd have him biting...had I not known at what depth the fish were and how they reacted to the lure I'm guessing I would have gotten a small fraction of the bites I did with the unit.  You also know within one or two fish whether they are liking the bait/lure you are using.  I hadn't fished this water for two years and had no luck the times I had gone previously...as it were this past weekend was one of the best trips I've had this year....that would not have been the case had I not had the Vex.  The other bonus is, even if your not catching the fish just seeing them come up and look at your bait adds tremendously to the excitement.  I had my girlfriend out with me this weekend and I know it would not have been the same for her (or for me for that matter) had we not had the interactiveness of the finder.  Thats just my two cents.

[don_m]

Can a flasher give you an accurate reading of the depth that the tops of weeds are at?

don m

[crappieloo]

Absolutely, i use my FL- 8 all the time to shoot through the ice to locate weed growth


Crappieloo

[genz_man]

Yea jiggem up ......not jiggem over like I know 1 guy does. You can chech this site cause sometimes guys have units to sell on here that are more then reasonably priced

[baginwal]

Check out Reeds, they have the FL8 propack on sale!

[klein]

I believe there is a cheaper way, than a flasher.

I bought for about 120$ brand new, an portable eagle fish finder. what I do in the winter ( because I also use it in the summer on my aluminum boat ) is set up the fish finder on display 2.  Which mean all you got is every reflection as a signal, this is just as live as a flasher,
and you can see your own spoon, or jipsy jig.

You need to fool around with it a little bit to get it just right, but once you know how, it's fantastic, and a lot cheaper.

[Hard_H2O]

klein,

I still favor my FL-8 but here is a thread about the Lowrance LPF-220.

http://www.iceshanty.com/cgi-bin/forum/YaBB.cgi?board=equipment;action=display;num=10465306961;start=20

It has some good reasoning behind using an LCD versus a flasher.

[bigredonice]

now a flasher definetly doesnt catch fish for you, but it can make THE difference

example - small pond, one acre in size, been catching crappies and big sunnies that are suspended exactly 4 feet from bottom.

told a friend about it, and he and another good fisherman went, and couldnt catch anything.

I and "fishingking" went later that day and hammered them again - out of their same holes.