20140607 - some sonar / poon shots

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jbdba01
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20140607 - some sonar / poon shots

Post by jbdba01 »

We found ourselves with some happy poon and after a bit they welcomed us to their environment. One pod of 100 joined another and then another - my angling buddy and I called it a megapod. Kinda like those HUGE schools of dolphins you see on Nat Geo. Just a huge black mass of fish. Pretty neat. Since this is more of a stink pot story I'll skip the details, but post the photos.

All shots taken with a Cannon T2i 135mm. Unfortunately I missed some money shots where 10's of poon roll at once.

"Happy Poon"

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I call this the "Poon Hopscotch" - get in front of them, fish, get in from of them, fish..."Rinse lather, repeat."

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Daisy chaining poon on the side imaging sonar. The center line was the path of the boat; you can see we were pretty much on top of them. In some cases the pod was so big we could not cast across it. Each one of those white blips is a poon; the black is the sonar "shadow" of that same fish. You can see that the school blots out the screen to the right of the school. That's a bunch of fish.

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Megapod...I believe it was smaller than this image indicates as I'm pretty sure we turned as we went by, but you can see it's pretty big. Call it +300 fish

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So...the $100K questions.

With all the poonage around how many did we get?
We jumped 2 - yes only two. These fish were more interested in doing the wild thing than eating. We were on them for 3-4 hours. We tried everything live bait, cut bait, live cut bait, artificial, power chum...you name it we did it. That said, one fish was massive. She didn't care about being hooked. Took her about about 5 min to decide to make a run and then jump. We were sure it was a hammerhead. It was to the point I put the camera away, sat down, and told my counter part - "Enjoy that shark, kinda odd it has't snapped the line yet. Must be foul hooked." 10 seconds later the fish presents itself and says "Later boys, you can have your hook back."

Is all that technology worth it?
Frankly the jury is out. On a school this big one once you find them they are hard to lose (assuming no one powers over them). What the sonar told us was that we were on the right line, but again with good glasses you could see these fish. It also eliminated water because sometimes a the shade from a cloud would mess up our line of sight and we would rely on technology or the old fashion way "You see 'em rolling?" At the bridge the technology does help. Not too many people kayak the bridge - and frankly I wouldn't recommend it, but to each his own. It does help find bait for sure. On the side imaging it looks more like a cloud than individual fish. This unit cost about $600 now; if I were to have an unlimited budget I would buy an 8-10" screen. 5" is not enough, but my boat is so small 8" would take up a bunch of real estate.
Last edited by jbdba01 on Mon Jun 09, 2014 9:56 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 20140607 - some sonar / poon shots

Post by Rik »

jbdba01 wrote:That said, one fish was massive. He didn't care about being hooked. Took him about about 5 min to decide to make a run and then jump.
If it was a huge tarpon, it was a "she".
Over every mountain there is a path, although it may not be seen from the valley
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jbdba01
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Re: 20140607 - some sonar / poon shots

Post by jbdba01 »

10-4; Thread tweaked. Moderation appreciated.
JB
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