OUTDOORS: To LiveScope or not to Livescope?
Jun. 17—I've had several discussions this week about the new LiveScope fish finders that have hit the market recently. The LiveScopes allow an angler to see the fish in their habitat, and, as one angler put it; it allows an angler to drop his ore her lure down and rub it on their nose if necessary.
I'm sure there are those anglers out there that just think these are great and are willing to pay the $1,500-$2,500 to put one on their boat! But hold on! Where is the challenge of fishing? As far as I'm concerned, you might as well use dynamite!
My opinion is that they should be outlawed in all tournament fishing period! Many anglers can't afford the high price tag to put one in their boat and some anglers are just too lazy to go out and find the fish like anglers have done in for centuries.
Do the anglers that use these really think their catch will make an old angler stand up and clap; probably not!
I had a friend of mine from Indiana purchase one of these new devices and he has turned in several very large crappie since he got it. He told me that he can see the fish and drop the bait right down in front of them in a brush pile. He told me he can even see the fish and watch him suck it in.
I seriously doubt that any angler with one of these LiveScopes will ever turn in the stringers of bass, out of this immediate area around Danville, that I saw after Illini Bass Club where anglers either didn't use electronics or used the old flasher units.
Every body of water has places in it that fish come up to for food. These places are not hard-to-find if you reason them out. All the older anglers knew how to find these places and where
they were and they would sit on them for long periods of time, waiting for a big fish to come up.
I've fished with younger anglers in the last ten years or so who would scour the banks not having a clue of where the good structures were located; catching nothing but "bank runners" and thinking they were doing great!
Now, if you show me a nice fish you caught; put it on Facebook or show me pictures, the first thing I'm going to ask you is whether or not you have a LiveScope!
My walls are full of big fish (I'm no longer proud of the fact that I killed them to put them there) all caught without electronics and all within 25 miles of my front door. Some were caught when I used nothing but a brick and a rope to find depth; most taken off good structure that I had found.
I'm sure there will be some that will disagree with this column; most of them will own a LiveScope! I am a firm believer of fairness, especially when fishing a tournament for money. I would suggest that either everyone in a tournament uses one of these or that everyone fishing that tournament goes without them. To me, they are nothing better or worse than a canned hunt, a put-and-take pheasant hunt, shooting fish in a rain barrel, or shooting a big deer while it is eating your Hosta's out of your front yard.
Believe this or not, I once had a customer in my taxidermy business, see a big deer hit by a car and lying on the side of the road. This guy went home, got his bow, and shot the deer. Then he brought the deer to me, had it mounted, and bragged about the big deer he killed! Where has the fairness of the hunt, that our fathers and forefathers knew, gone?
Sam Van Camp writes about the outdoors on Saturdays. Fax: 446-6648. Email: pamnsam70@aol.com
