Northern Trails The Fishing Boat: Some High-tech Add-ons By Gord Ellis
For many of us, fishing and boats are a magical pairing. Yes, you can work parts of a lake from the shore, or from a dock, but the angler it is at a significant disadvantage. Get in a boat on a lake, however, and the whole game changes. While any boat is better than no boat, the basic fishing craft has really changed over the years. Generally, modern fishing boats are larger, drier and have cleaner running outboards than the craft many of us grew up with. On top of that, technology has made some remarkable advances. Here are just a few of the neat additions you can consider on your boat before this year’s open water season.
Electronics Nothing has had more of a radical impact on how people fish on lakes, rivers and reservoirs than sonar. Although flashers and fish finders have been around for decades, modern sonar units have technology once only available to the military or NASA. Companies including Humminbird, Lowrance and Garmin have units that are not only high definition, but have advanced GPS capabilities. For instance, on my main fishing boat, the main unit—a Humminbird Helix 9— has the ability to run a number of different functions at once. The GPS mapping allows me to see where I am running on the lake and at what speed, while laying down a virtual “track.” Another function shows me the depth and bottom even when running at a high speed. A side scanning system shows what is on bottom to the right and left of the boat. The accuracy of this is similar to a radar as you can see individual rocks and fish. You can toggle over on the screen and drop a way point on some reef or structure that catches your eye. To top it all off, a program called Autochart builds a depth map of the lake and stores it on a chip. This slowly builds an accurate depth map of the lake. Best of all, you can watch all of these functions at once, or separately, if you desire. This is not your Grampa’s fishfinder.
Trolling Motors Another huge change for anglers has been the arrival of “smart” trolling motors. While the basic concept of the classic bow mount trolling motor has remained the 26
FEBRUARY 2021
Running a bow mount trolling motor with a remote. | GORD ELLIS
NORTHERN WILDS
