Over the years, I have done enough seminars at enough fishing and outdoor shows that I’ve heard just about every question possible about catching largemouth bass. But when people see me somewhere and I’m in my Ranger boat, fishing or coming off the ramp or weighing in at a tournament, the question I get the most is an easy one.
They point at the flasher unit I have mounted and ask, “What is that?”
I can only shake my head that a generation of fishermen could possibly have missed out on using the first and one of the most-effective pieces of marine electronics available. Sure, compared to today’s electronics, it seems pretty elementary. Fact is, it still works, still does the exact purpose for which it was designed – scanning the bottom for depth, cover and structure, and sometimes even fish.
Which brings me to the subject of this month’s Lunker Lines: forward-facing sonar and two major tournament circuits’ recent decisions to restrict or completely do away with its use.
Changes coming
Late this past summer, the National Professional Fishing League – I’m currently a part of it – announced that beginning in 2025, forward-facing sonar units will be prohibited from its events. A couple of days later, BASS announced that it would restrict fishermen in the 2025 Bassmaster Classic and on its 2025 Elite Series of tournaments to one live sonar transducer per boat, mounted on the trolling motor at the bow, and a total of 55 inches of screen, including bow and console units.
These are fantastic moves, especially for NPFL, and a great move for BASS, if it’s done right. It wouldn’t surprise me at all if BASS doesn’t take another step backwards for 2026.
While FFS is a tremendous move forward in marine electronics technology, it probably wasn’t the best thing to introduce to competitive bass fishing. To speak very simply, it changed too many things, going away from the kind of fishing that made competitive bass fishing so popular.
First of all, it eliminates the huge technology advantage that many fishermen can have, just by the size of their bank accounts. NPFL said it best when explaining its rule change: “…we do not want competitive bass fishing to become a technology arms race….”
Take this to the bank: you can spend almost as much on your electronics as you do for your whole bass boat. I know fishermen who were using four or five, as many as eight transducers. Some people had three, four, five units on the bow and three, four, five units on the back. They were hanging trolling motors with transducers on their Power Poles. It got to the point that guys could see all the water out to about 100 yards, all the way around their boats. They just put their trolling motor down and look around, zoom in, and if they don’t see any fish, they move.
FFS makes you able to catch fish that aren’t on the bottom, not holding on cover, not around bait – just swimming around. We’ve been catching fish that hadn’t even been fished for until FFS. And that type of fishing is difficult for certain people, especially older and middle-aged fishermen who struggle with it. And it’s not fun to watch on TV. It’s just not fun to watch, and there’s no competing without it. If you’re not using it, you’ll be lucky to make top 50 in a tournament.
This is much more fair for the broad spectrum of anglers, and it’s going to be a lot more competitive. You won’t have 25 or 35 guys who are doing stuff nobody else is able to do because they can’t afford it. We’ll be going back to old-fashioned pattern fishing, finding fish around cover.
Level playing field
NPFL has made fishing a real game where you have to find fish with your bait. It’s a tremendous step. And BASS has leveled the playing field. Pattern fishing will be big again. Hey, flipping will even come back. Pros might catch fish again on spinnerbaits and crankbaits, instead of little, bitty plastic baits fished on 6-pound line. A lot of things that required real hard work will be back.
You’ll still have side-imaging and down-imaging, so you can find those pieces of cover. And some of the guys who are so good with FFS are also really good fishermen, so they’ll be okay not having to rely on it.
One other thing is, it’s going to make our sport safer. There’s no question that the way some guys were stacking up units on the console, big units – up to 16 inches – that got to be a dangerous way to drive a bass boat. It got to be a hazard. That’s gone in NPFL, and BASS has gone a long way to making things safer. Basically, now fishermen will be able to have two units on the bow and two on the console, and they won’t be stacked on top of each other.
In its announcement of the changing rules, BASS said, “The trend to add more and bigger head units to boats is becoming a safety concern, as the bigger screens may create blind spots impacting the safe piloting of boats.”
Face it, FFS has made all of us a little lazy; there has been no competing without it. Now, we’ll have to go back to finding and catching fish the way Bill Dance and Roland Martin and Denny Brauer caught them when they were building professional bass fishing into a nationwide sport.
And maybe, just maybe, somebody besides me might put a flasher unit on his boat.
Mount it up:
With forward-facing sonar units getting regulated in professional fishing circuits, anglers adept at using older technology just might regain an important edge over others.
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