Lake Champlain United - Forums

Took this picture of my sounder earlier this summer in outer mallets bay. I've shown it around to a few people and none of us know what it is. Any ideas what I marked?

I would think a big school of bait?!! Sleeps

I think you found " Champ " ...

BB

Bassbuddy wrote:I think you found " Champ " ...

BB

Ditto

It could be bait, but I've never seen bait make an arc like that.

I was on the lake during the weekend and I marked a lot of bait schools in different areas.
Some were over 50 feet in height, and if your speed and direction is right, as the school and the boat move it could create some incredible images on the screen.
On your screen, you can also see the presence of many predators around the school.

I would say a school of alewives. They are much less temperature specific than smelt. Similar marks that don't cover that much of vertical water column I would say were smelt. The big domes like that, look like alewives to me.

Jaws

I have to agree with Hawkeye...alewife's.

Those 2 big arches are schools of bait, you have to remember that the reason fish show up as arches is that when they first come into the transducers cone they are the furthest away from the transducer, think right triangle, as the boat moves over them that distance decrease in length from the transducer until you are right over them which is the highest point of the arch and the closest to the transducer, then as you move away from them the distance from the transducer starts to increase again, this is how the arch is formed.

Here is an article with diagrams explaining how arches are formed.
http://blogs.basspro.com/blog/bass-pro- ... -olathe-ks

Pat

Alewives

How it works:
http://biggeorgiaspots.com/boats-and-el ... ?showall=1

Bassbuddy wrote:I think you found " Champ " ...

BB

I think thats Champ on top and Champette on bottom.

BAIT, methinks