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Is it really ‘fishing’ when using high tech electronics?


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I’d like to see some novice go up against one of these guys with all the  fancy electronics that they have.

 

pretty sure that they’d get destroyed.

 

my brother does this in NC. I’d be willing to bet he’d smoke half you saying it’s easy but have mever done it, with or without equipment. 
 

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Me personally, I don’t think it’s real fishing but whatever. If I were to use a depth finder, I would use it to locate structure, see where the fish are oriented, and LEARN the patterns that the fish follow for later use. Not just cheat. I don’t use electronics as of now. 

"It's funny how it's the little things in life that mean the most
Not where you live, what you drive or the price tag on your clothes" -Zac Brown Band

 

"A leader is someone who keeps their head when everyone else is losing theirs." -Bryant Wright

 

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As long as there are competitive tournaments with prize money involved equipment evolution will occur to give contestants a edge. It’s not cheating if it’s available to everyone even if it’s costly. 
 

You can see it in all sports with prize money. Sporting clays, golf, tennis, you name it it’s a equipment and technology race. Fishing is no different. Outlaw electronics what’s next? Power poles? Outboard size, boat costs, etc.... Bass fishing is a long way away from its origins of a long stick, string, hair jig, doodlesocking from shore. I get the feeling of unfairness or reducing the individual talents of one fisherman over another but this equipment and technology race has been going on for a very long time and it is to the point of you want to play your gonna have to pay. Like archery: pro archery is a long way away from a stick shooting a stick. Now bows are close to 2k, holding 90% of peak weight, and with optics even with devices that read riser defection during draw and tell you when to shoot with a colored light going off in your 10x scope. 
 

Fishing is fun, shooting clays is fun, archery is fun...... do it in a cash prize tournament and it’s only fun for one of the contestants. The rest blame their loss on equipment deficiencies. Want to play you are gonna have to pay like everyone else if you want to be the one individual afterwards that had fun. If someone doesn’t like the technologies that’s fine but best of luck even getting your entry money back  Every competitor knew the rules going in and paid their entry thinking they can win. 99 out of 100 were wrong.

Edited by Jim DE
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4 hours ago, Jim DE said:

You can see it in all sports with prize money. Sporting clays, golf, tennis, you name it it’s a equipment and technology race.

But many sports get to the point where they say "ENOUGH!!" and draw some lines. There's tons of golf balls that are illegal in competition. Some sports even standardize equipment like 'one design' sailing where everyone is in exactly the same boat and the best sailor wins, not the one who spent the most on gear. As just one example, limiting bass boat performance would be a great thing, having GPS reported top speeds limited to an arbitrary low speed like 20mph would make choosing your spots more critical, and make it more about fishing, right?

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8 mins ago, gellfex said:

But many sports get to the point where they say "ENOUGH!!" and draw some lines. There's tons of golf balls that are illegal in competition. Some sports even standardize equipment like 'one design' sailing where everyone is in exactly the same boat and the best sailor wins, not the one who spent the most on gear. As just one example, limiting bass boat performance would be a great thing, having GPS reported top speeds limited to an arbitrary low speed like 20mph would make choosing your spots more critical, and make it more about fishing, right?

Have you ever even watched a bass tournament?

 

 

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Just now, gellfex said:

Not in a long time and not much. Why? I know there's a lot of 'run and gun', but does there have to be?

That’s part of the fun.
 

 

Generally, but not all the time, the tournaments have gated release times, the anglers go out and prospect the lake fishing it in advance prior to the tournament. Literally trying to move fish around to thier spots before it’s show time. Depending on your launch time has alot to do with where your fishing that day, it’s looks like a race because it is, if someone get to your spot you can’t fish there, because of the regulations. Rod length is regulated, reels are regulated, number of rods used at one time is regulated.

 

The tournament starts  long before the tournament actually starts. Generally when my brother goes out for a tournament he’s fishing the water source weeks ahead of time. Prospecting and deciding where to punch it to first, and what to do if he get a bad start time.

 

It’s all agreed upon when they sign up.  Rule are clearly laid out for them and if you violate them your disqualified, if you actually cheat and do something like hire a diver to put fish on your line during the tournament, that will basically be the last one you’ll ever compete in.

 

it’s still fishing, not catching. 

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They did limit hp at one time ... I remember out in MO we were limited to 125hp but that was when BASS first started around 1970 or so. 50 years later we see bass boat with twice that all the time. Time and technologies make governing bodies adapt rules to what their membership want. 

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14 mins ago, Callmefish said:

Rod length is regulated, reels are regulated, number of rods used at one time is regulated.

So there are rules just like most sports. You can make the rules whatever everyone agrees on them to be. They could limit the electronics just like they limit the length of the rod.

 

I've been watching the America's Cup on YouTube and it's kind of interesting how it has evolved technologically.  They have a whole lot of very clear limitations and specifications while at the same time deliberately leaving open windows for innovation as these monohull sailboats hit highway speeds. 

 

Ex: the operation of the boat has to be human powered, yet the hydrofoils and trimming controls take tremendous power. So they have eight guys aboard who do nothing but crank handles that generate hydraulic pressure for the control systems!

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13 mins ago, Jim DE said:

They did limit hp at one time ... I remember out in MO we were limited to 125hp but that was when BASS first started around 1970 or so. 50 years later we see bass boat with twice that all the time. Time and technologies make governing bodies adapt rules to what their membership want. 

My beother boat does well over 100mph across the water, it’s  terrifying. He took my wife and I for a trip down the cape fear river when we went to visit. The skin on your face literally gets pulled back from the wind in your face, then you look at his hummingbird and realize your in 2-3 feet deep water. Well , the prop is in the water anyway. If you stop to quickly you’ll capsize yourself. It was so fun.

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8 hours ago, buddha162 said:

The pro tour showcases peak performance in bass fishing. They are also selling boats/motors/graphs/tackle. Arbitrary limits and rules are not going to happen...they're pros, they will spend the money and learn to use new technology (or quit and get a 9-5 lol).

Exactly, the tournament are there to push products, new tech, and promote bass fishing and fishing in general. Many of our current crop of fisherman might not have gotten started if it were not for the hype from bass tournaments and their pros. The tournaments are a proving grounds for new tech, techniques, and tackle the manufacturers want to sell.

 

The good news for the average Joe is you can't make the fish bite and many Pros will fail on any given day while others find some fish and figure out the trigger them.

 

One of the first things I learned when I got the very first little green box flasher unit from Lowrance was finding fish and knowing where they are doesn't mean you can catch them.

 

Experience, knowledge, skill, and even instinct are all contributing factors in the world of fishing.

 

I was surprised it took many of the Pros about 30 years to realize the potential of deep water finesse techniques because some of us have been using those same techniques for 35 years to find quality fish most folks missed. I was also amused when some of the Pros complain about catching walleyes when they are deep finessing because that is exactly how we figured out those techniques for both walleyes and bass.

 

There is a lot of crossover when it comes to fishing techniques for multispecies in fresh and saltwater.

Edited by Jay Blair

"May your travels always take you to where the water meets the shore"

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And yet when the "Alabama Rig" first came out BASS banned it's use in certain Tournaments. Here's what they said "the Alabama Rigs make it too easy for the pro anglers to catch fish".

https://oklahoman.com/article/3642494/alabama-rig-is-being-banned-at-some-bass-tournament-trails

 

I guess when it comes to the advertising so that Lowrance or Garmin (Those who SPONSOR the Tx's) can showcase their $3000 units it's a different story.

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20 hours ago, buddha162 said:

There are a few older pros pushing back against FF sonar tech but they are lone voices in the wilderness, and most of them are set up with FF systems now too just to compete. In pro bass fishing it's already the standard. Some HB pros got caught with Garmin livescopes in the mix last few tournaments and HB came down hard. I'd like to see tournaments limited to just 2D/side scan but hard not to take Garmin/Lowrance/HB money if you're running a tournament or a sponsored pro. 

 

The money aspect of this equipment is going to keep it in play for tournaments from here on out.

 

I figured the middle road option would be easier to put in place.

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19 hours ago, Callmefish said:

I’d like to see some novice go up against one of these guys with all the  fancy electronics that they have.

 

pretty sure that they’d get destroyed.

 

my brother does this in NC. I’d be willing to bet he’d smoke half you saying it’s easy but have mever done it, with or without equipment. 
 

 

A novice would get destroyed by a pro who is using all his fancy equipment.

 

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