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Posts: 80
Location: Waukesha, WI | I seem to have a hard time picking out colors for baits and lakes that I fish. The lakes that I mainly fished this year were Oconomowoc, Okauchee, Pewaukee, Fowler, Little St.Germain, and the Moen lake chain. Most of the waters a lot of you know about but, Moen is the only dark water I have fished this year so I am mainly a clear water fisherman you can say. If it were up to me I would buy all the colors of a lure and buy every lure that way. But I have a limited budget. I am looking for suggestions on colors, and have heard perch works well, but I am looking for other colors that will work on my home lakes. What colors would you recomend for cranks, topwater, bucktails, gliders, etc.?
Any info is appreciated.
Mike Warren |
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Posts: 16632
Location: The desert | Lost a decent fish on Ocon on a motor oil and orange bulldawg...also saw another fish moved on a brown double cowgirl. Crappie is always a good pattern. Dont be afraid of bright colors either. Perch pattern is my favorite on those lakes though.
Mike |
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Posts: 1168
| Have A-ROZ make you one of these bad boys so you have all of your bases covered.
http://muskie.outdoorsfirst.com/board/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=28... |
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Posts: 313
Location: On your favorite spot | My opinion on bait colors is pick something that you like, something you'll be able to work with confidence. I'm not familiar with your lakes but if water is really dark I'd start with something bright. Maybe pick something like a bright suick or bucktail that you can see when you're fishing with it. That will help your confidence.
Most important I think, pick something that looks good to you and have some confidence in it. As you fish more, it will become apparent where the "holes" are in your bait and color selections and then you can buy wisely. I bought a bunch of stuff when I first started fishing but now I buy a lot smarter when I see a need for a different tool. |
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Posts: 1996
Location: Pelican Lake/Three Lakes Chain | All muskies everywhere eat fish of natural colors. You can never go wrong using perch, sucker, bullhead, shiner, cisco, or any other "bait fish" colors. That is the most natural presentation there is.
That being said, I don't spend anytime on the southern waters you mentioned, but I do fish the Moens...natural colors work very well there but I have had very good results with oranges, firetigers, and chartreuse, especially the last two.
If I am ever in doubt though, I always err on the side of natural colors.
One other thing I always try to include in any bait choice is some sort of contrasting colors. Seems to give the fish a better "target" to tee off on.
Edited by nwild 11/28/2006 3:40 PM
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Posts: 94
| I fish predominantly in dark waters, and my experiences are that bright colors work best in my waters, colors such as firetiger, bright orange, tiger stripe and also redhead. |
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| How many of you are old enough to remember The Color-C-Lector?
It had a probe that you lowered in the water and it gave you a reading as to which colors were most visible in that water at whatever depth you wanted. Do they still make it?
Colors? Use what you like. Match the hatch. Go with your gut. There is no bad color, only fish that aren't hungry.
Me? I like multi colors with contrast that has some gold or silver added to it. |
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Posts: 605
Location: Marshfield, WI | I got the Combo-C-Lector. It has the Color-C-Lector, Ph, and something else, maybe water temp. I used it a lot when I was younger. I remember this one time, I was coming up to a weedy point and I had a chartreuse Gator spoon on, for pike fishing. The person I was with wanted me to see what colors we should use. I took it out and it said to use flourescent orange. So I put my orange Gator spoon on instead. On my first or 2nd cast, I had a hit, miss, and then he hit it again. Turned out to be my biggest pike at the time, 36". No clue if he would have hit the chartreuse one but my orange one is a lot more chewed up than my other ones.
I also used it a lot for walleye fishing. Seemed that the person using the correct color jighead caught a lot more fish than the other guy.
Krishna
Edited by k-bob 11/28/2006 8:40 PM
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Posts: 32951
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | Light meters.
See any possible problems there with where the probe might be dropped?
What colors make up:
'green'?
'orange'?
'Purple'?
The paint on the lure; what is the base color for the orange used? What color is the orange painted over, and is it opaque?
One of my favorite subjects.
Try this:
take a couple lures of the same 'firetiger' pattern by different builders. Hang them outside a window as the sun goes down, and see as the light fails if they are the same.
What color is your car in a darkened parking lot?
What happens to light in the water?
What direction do muskies look, most of the time?
When do muskies see color and when do they not see color so well, and how does that work?
What color is orange in thirty feet of water?
Red?
Blue?
Green?
Brown?
Black?
White?
Yellow?
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Posts: 3918
| You only see the manner in which light vaves are reflecting off the objects anyway. It's a physics thing. Color blind people are not wrong to see a different color than you or I. Their eyes just work different intrepreting the visual stimuli. Ever notice how the colors of EVERYTHING change during a major solar eclipse? We see light waves bouncing off stuff, and colors change as the frequency of the waves change. Truth be told, I've heard that certain chemicals will create the situation where you see very distinct patterns on what was previoulsy solid colors. And later on they get back to being solid colors. But in between, those patterns are a real as anything else your brain is managing.
Ok with all that speculation, I'll offer something useful....
In clear water natural colors work best. Except when they don't. Then you have to use crazy stuff like all hot pink muskie killers. Which are killer baits in gin clear water, sometimes. If you can find one, nab a Buchertail 700 in sunburst blade and purple hair. If you find two, send me one.
Lots of respected guys go for baits with a sharp contrast, like a bright yellow blade and an all black tail on a hair bait. Or a crank with a dark top and a light bottom. Or a silver blade with black hair with a small bright twister tail at the end.
One thing fer sure, at night is is easier for a fish to look up and see a dark bait against the bright surface.
I don't use real bright baits much on pressured clear waters, I lean toward natural colors. Perch is good, walleye and sucker also. I even have a bass Grannies that they call some strange Shad name, but it looks just like a bass. I move 'em fast.
Best color lately has been gliders with black front (60%) and an orange tail end (40%).
One bucktail you must have is a Hirsches Ghosttail in white perch with a white blade. Get two when you're buying, they tend to get damaged by fish pretty quick.
I have abook around here somewhere that gives the colors appropriate to envioronmental condions. I'll try to find it. |
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Posts: 1530
| water color sets bait color. some areas are clear, some tea stained. thats hoe i select. different colors for different regions |
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Posts: 1939
Location: Black Creek, WI | Complicated subject.... as Worrall eluded to. However, its is one that I have researched and considered for many years. Today I put less emphasis on color... but always consider it in my lure selections.
However, to keep things simple I could probably get by with only purchasing two colors for any given bait. One "natural" and one "fluorescent". Pending the type of lure and water it will see the most playing time... I'll either favor a cisco (white/silver) or sucker (brown/gold) type pattern for a "natural" look. For fluorescent colors.... I'll always favor chartruese for the Purkinje Shift window... even on clear water systems. But... you can't pass up orange if you fish tannic stained water either.
And... if I had to go with only ONE color pattern... it would be a hybrid pattern.... something like the Maina Glitter Perch. Bright yet natural.
The ultimate question is when should you use one color over another. Once you have some sort of strategy for determining that... your lure color selection will get much easier. Or... if you feel fish are rejecting your presentation due to the wrong color... then consider the notion that perhaps you are targeting the wrong fish???? That idea should help keep your lure color requirements to a minimum too (heh heh). |
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| Im now taking the same aproach alot of the Mille Lacs,vermillion,and tonka pros are taking,,go into thornes bros pick out the bait you want then look at the color 'peg" that has the fewest missing or none,,thats the color the fish are not seeing |
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Posts: 8856
| LOL Steve...
I see you have read all that stuff too!!
At one point I actually thought it would be valuable to learn it all, knowing which wavelengths are absorbed at different depths, what colors are most visible in different types of water, and how a muskies eye structure differes from ours...
Figure out what color every lure is in every kind of water and every type of light, then take into account how a muskie probably sees color...
Man, put all the pieces together and you have the perfect formula for figuring out exactly what color bait to throw under every possible condition!!!!
But then muskies feed up and your lures are silouetted against the sky...
SO WAIT, if you make the lure a contrasting color to the background, orange would work on a sunny day, unless the water is really clear and an orange lure would look unnatural...
And if baitfish are natually camoflaged, then you want something that goes against that, right? So the fish can see the lure???
But wait, they have a lateral line. You catch them at night, you catch them in dirty water, there's no way they can see what they are eating. Do we have to fool them with something that looks just like a perch? If so why does orange work? NOTHING is orange. And of red dissapears first and just looks brown/gray, why not make the lure brown??????
"Hmmm... It's sunny today, there's a little algae bloom, I want to fish down 12 feet, that means black will look..."
BAH
Buy the black one and be done with it |
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Posts: 8856
| Ranger - 11/29/2006 1:48 AM
Truth be told, I've heard that certain chemicals will create the situation where you see very distinct patterns on what was previoulsy solid colors. And later on they get back to being solid colors. But in between, those patterns are a real as anything else your brain is managing.... QUOTE]
Hey Ranger --
I've uhhh... I've "heard" that same thing! It's been a lot of years since I heard it, though, so the memory is kind of foggy.
It was beyond description, Like Jehova's favorite choir!
Where's Mikie?
Edited by esoxaddict 11/29/2006 12:02 PM
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Posts: 1168
| I've refrained from geeking out about this topic until now...but that bucktail that AROZ tied up for me was a byproduct of geeking out over this color stuff.
I would guess that the reason why flourescent baits work is because they maintain their intensity and color at deeper depths than regular colors would so you'd have more flash from a flourescent bait due to higher intensity. Black simply gives a consistent contrast to everything (outside of black) and this is a big reason why it's such a popular surface bait color. Alot of times there are better choices that give off a more defined contrast to it's background but black is consistent.
Just gotta remember that what we see as a pattern doesn't mean that is the way it looks under water and our eyes are physiologically different than that of a muskie. If you want to have fun take all of your baits out and hold them against different backgrounds to see how contrast works. It's quite fascinating....Last year I went so far as to carry around a 1 gallon pickle jar in my boat and on particularly stained, bloomed, or turbid water I'd fill it up and dunk baits in there to get a feel for how water clarity altered the look of these baits. I had a folder with different colors of cellophane to check baits under but pulling out the pickle jar made guys question my sanity which was more entertaining.
Personally, I'm not satisfied with just figuring out what color is working, I need to know why that color is working. Why did that fish prefer this red bait over that red bait...they look the same, same bait type, same size, worked the same way, nearly identical action, but why is one outproducing the other one?
A great resource on color is the third chapter of Joe Bucher's Crankbait Secrets book. Not overly technical and scientific but pretty straight forward. I'd recommend it if you can get your hands on it.
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Posts: 8856
| Since we're going geek...
I always thought it would be cool to scuba dive and have a buddy in the boat toss all your baits above you. If you could only make a facemask that mimicked the rod and cone structure of a muskies eyeballs, you would have a pretty good idea what they are seeing.
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Posts: 2089
| Hot, Natural,Light, Dark,Contrast.They're fish.Put it in their face and hope and pray.Don't think too much.Just fish! Steve |
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| Action, size, and color contrast are more important than color but sometimes one color gets consistently hammered on a certain day or specific body of water. In general I stick to bright, constrasting, colors in most water conditions but favor natural colors and flouro leaders in very clear water conditions.
Some people do well with bright belly lures, some people insist on red eyes, some people insist on black...they all seem to have their time and place.
The important thing to remember is use first what you have confidence in, and then experiment with different colors to see if it makes a difference  |
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Posts: 16632
Location: The desert | Addict,
For a small fee I'll don some scuba gear and tell you what the baits look like.
Mike |
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Posts: 32951
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | Try the experiment I mentioned..
Remember contrast.
Answer the questions I posed, one at a time.
Remember also, NOTHING you do with a lure is 'natural'.
Watch a perch in an aquarium or for that matter in the lake, and tell me when it looks like or behaves in any way like a lure. |
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| Have a bunch of lures in the color scheme of the baitfish in the lake you are fishing and a bunch in the complete opposite...pick colors that look good to you..why? if it looks good to you, you will throw it with confidence...when I put a lure in the water and it just doesn't look good to me I don't throw it..if you have confidence in a lure color/action it is alot more likely to get fished alot and properly...
as stated by SW, lures are not exactly natural..so just pick colors that you think will look good in the waters you fish...
fish will eat just about anything...so keep that in mind.. |
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Posts: 3518
Location: north central wisconsin | I love orange lures in dark water, but also realize I do much better on orange lures that I keep high in the water column, due to the orange 'losing' its 'glow' as it gets deeper. I now use high contrast stuff when fishing deeper in the column on dark(dirty) waters with the jlong mentioned chartreause perch patterns being high on my list. The bright stuff is especially high on my list in waters that have not seen much pressure and earlier in the season on higher pressured systems. I do notice a decline in effectiveness of very bright lures, after awhile on either of these two scenarios, save for peak periods. Don't want to start the conditioning debate, but do beleive Buchers old adage 'dumb fish eat firetiger'.
Another thing to note is the propensity of fish to eat surface lures in colors other than black at night, actually choosing them at times. I used to be in the black only at night camp. Being a confirmed topwater junky, I just use my confidence lures and they work equally, and often better, than the 'right' colored ones. Is it that they can see the color, or quite possibly cannot see the lure quite as easily, making them come in for a closer look. Just know it is real.
I have a friend who absolutely slays fish on red. I started using red more the past couple years, and certain red lures, bright red ones, were my best producers this year. These are deeper running lures too. I was/am under the assumption that red loses quickly when taken deeper. Could I be using dark grey or brown with the same type of effectiveness, or visibility in darker deeper water??
Edited by Reef Hawg 12/2/2006 8:50 AM
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Posts: 32951
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | Red goes black very quickly as that wavelength is filtered out by the water column. Is red the same as black if red isn't available in the spectrum? It's so close it's near impossible for the human eye to select. Orange is made by mixing red and yellow or painting both over a white, light gathering base. That goes a sort of brown in low light.
At night, literally, there is no color. Also, fish use a different system to see when light diminishes than they use during high light periods. The change over from cone(color) vision to Rod(grays, black, white) is based on an internal 'clock', not the sun. By dusk, the process is pretty well completed in most fish.
One has to consider which way the fish is looking, too. There is frequently a 'glow' on calmer night waters, which the lure breaks up like a moving crack and associated hole in a mirror.
Contrast becomes my concern in low light when fishing sight feeders. Black always creates a contrast in the field. Black and white really covers it. Painted lures will generally be something in between. Try going into a dark room, just enough ambient light to see a bit, and figure out which lures are what color. I do that in a seminar I used to present using filter material to take the light down on a screen with an overhead. I have a selection of bright, dark, and medium colored lures, and show them in order. No one can tell what color they are, even the really bright firetiger.
There is some evidence that Muskies might be able to see in UV. |
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Posts: 3518
Location: north central wisconsin | I love going into the fishing room in the basement on a weekend night with a few beer drinking buds to shoot the breeze. I often do the same experiment when the subject turns to color. I turn the lights off, with only a beer sign(stars) or upstairs light coming through a crack in the door. The white bellied lures are always the easiest to see first and then make out the rest of, especially if the rest of the lure is a dark color. In absolute darkness(which we never have outside), color seems to make no difference and all lures show the same profile from below(to the human eye in my basement anyhow). I always thought the wildlife/fisheries/icth. professors told us that the cone to rod progression was photoperiod induced. The internal clock thing is interesting(didn't realize that), and could change the way some/I look at dark days and the coming dusk...
Yeah, that is what I thought about red. The color rocks regardless, and does so in very clear water too(maybe the only place the fish can really tell it is red..?..). It probably shows enough of itself down deep, to show good contrast(moving towards the black), but still have some color in its apearance.
Edited by Reef Hawg 12/3/2006 2:06 AM
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Posts: 80
Location: Clintonville, Wi | muskie vs mike,
Like jason said I also like red, the last two seasons has proved it is my most productive color. Like when i was a kid and we would go to canada for pike the ole red and white daredevil was the best bait in the box. tried the black and white, sure we caught fish but not as productive as the red. this year i caught fish in the clearest water to the darkest on red baits. I'm no scientist, therefore have no idea why fish like red, but i will be using alot of red in my arsenal in the years to come.
Jeremy Van Ert
www.beastteaser.com
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| Jason, this year I started throwing a holo redhorse Grandma....it has produced in clear water to stained water and it sure does look good to me...it is my fav color!
it has the white belly, red and black sides with a gold holo over it...it simply rocks in my book...wish I could get some more lures in that pattern....
I don't want to know what else you and your drinking buddies experiment with in your basement! lol |
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Posts: 32951
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | To continue the concept, consider this:
Absolutely clear water, sunrise. How much light is making it into the water column? Not much, and allot is reflected off the surface.
Add clouds.
Add waves.
It'll be pretty dark in just a few feet.
Take it to sun noon. Late or early in the year, less light than mid year because of the sun's axis position. Let's consider the longest day of the year, highest light penetration. Absolutely clear water. The abundance of light available for our red bait will still be limited by phytoplankton.
Red is gone in about 10' (source, Through the Fish's Eye, Sosin and Clark). The first few inches begin to take it out by prism effect. Any paint with a red base is effected in exactly the same manner, but the effect is altered by the colors added. The loss of red simply adds a dark cast to the remaining color until it also is removed from the spectrum. Consider a muskie attacking from 12' down at a just subsurface bait. That lure will appear black because the distance and physical properties of water as a prism are not dependent on the source of the light, 10' of water column will filter out most of the red wavelength.
Here's an excellent source or two:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underwater
http://www.fao.org/docrep/field/003/AC174E/AC174E04.htm
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2005/8/aafeature
Now also consider the source and angle of the available light/ambient light. Let's say the fish is facing north, away from the sun axis and penetration angle, looking at an angle towards a red bait from 12' down. Does the red hue 'last longer'? Yes, but only to the physical properties of that water body. It sure won't look red to the human eye from down there. Reverse that situation now, and the fish may see mostly shadow.
If one looks at the literal relationship between color and water, one is forced to accept that colors are muted under most of our angling opportunities. Add to that the fact it takes a considerable amount of time for the rod/cone transition as light fades and strengthens, and it's pretty much a total guess as to how much of the color we see on the bait when casting is available to the fish.
That's why I categorize my baits by what I feel is the contrast they offer:
Light color--throw against a dark contrast background, sunny skies, darker waters
Medium color--unfortunate accident of painting
dark color--throw against a light background, like a cloudy sky clear water
Sometimes I just don't worry about it and try them all. I think some days a certain signature from a 'hot lure' will trump color to a degree. |
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| Interesting stuff Steve...what do you feel about color at night?
I guess when I've nite fished I've caught muskies on just about every color but for some reason my rule of thumb has been if it's bright out (like a big moon with little clouds) I go with a light colored lure...if it's dark, I go dark....now this is mainly in clearer waters as I just don't feel color matters much at all at night in dark waters...what are your thoughts on color at night?
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