Kent’s Picks
Each week or so I’ll show you something new or novel that I think you should check out that you may not have seen while in the shop.
This little item probably looks more at home stuck to the side of a barn than it does on your boat or float tube but it can be a huge asset when looking for fish on the lake. It is a min/max thermometer and it is the least expensive way to accurately and quickly measure the temperature
of the water on the bottom (where the fish are). Trout like 56°F –57°F water and if you find that temperature you will almost always find a good concentration of fish.
That impressive digital readout on your pricey fish finder only tells you the surface temperature, which correlates poorly with the bottom temperature due to the fact there are always currents on the lake so it is almost useless in estimating the temperature on the bottom.
The way it works is that floating on top of the two mercury columns of the thermometer are little steel pins (yes, floats - mercury is almost twice as dense as steel) and when the mercury goes up and down as far as it can, the pins stay behind to read the highest and lowest temperatures since the last time the thermometer was reset. That little red gizmo on the string is the attached magnet used to reset it.
You simply pitch it overboard on a string, wait about 5 seconds, pull it back up and read the minimum temperature – that is the temperature on the bottom. These sell for a little over $20, one third the price of the electronic equivalent and are five times faster than the cheapo ones enclosed in a chamber which take forever to read and are not nearly as accurate.
If you happened to have purchased the underwater video, “Crowley, an Underwater Perspective” note the temperature readings when a fish is coming by the camera every ten seconds. You’ll be a believer in bottom water temperature like I am! -k
