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Location: Black Creek, WI | Interesting discussion. I'd focus on location first before I try to refine my lure and color selection. I'd start by targeting adjacent structures that offer some ambush points. The fish using these are often more willing to play and usually are in shallower locations where its easier to get a lure in front of them. If the cisco are staging for a movement after dark... try targeting where they will be then rather than following the bait to deep water durly daylight. Once musky contacts are made... then I'd start refining your lure choice and color. |
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| http://midcurrent.com/science/fish-eyesight-does-color-matter/
http://www.forciersguideservice.com/pages/posts/color-concepts14.ph...
http://www.esoxhunter.com/ColorsInWater.php
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Posts: 723
| I cant relate to cisco spawns, dont even know where to start.
but we fish around shad a majority of the year.
lots n lots of shad.
most of the guys I know including myself must
be dumb to the color, vibration, contrast, twitch pause,
burn, whatever. We can't get fish that are already way too fat on
way too much forage to eat. Its a non-issue.
We barely see them anymore.
I started fishing elsewhere,
Its been fun, we have narrowed patterns down,
color has mattered, action and presentation has really mattered. knowing where the fish are is over half the battle.
If youre on them, throw the kitchen sink at em! Given enough time
you'll figure out exactly what they want.
or go home shaking your head at what just happened.
shad suck! |
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Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | BNelson - 11/17/2011 11:07 AM
contrast/color ....whatever you want to call it...it's splitting hairs..ell I think we all know they don't catch many big fish...go over to the Bondy thread and tell Jon that he could catch just as many using a black bondy over the pearl ones that he says himself have been "hot" and see what he tells you...tell Gelb his Harley blue d raider could have been chartreuse and it would have caught the fish it has...tell the guys catching monster fish on V right now to put down the cisco and white pounders and use yellow... crax me up.
Nelson,
Not my problem you either don't want to know or are too self absorbed to learn. It's not at all splitting hairs. It's understanding what the fish actually sees and being able to make a call based on what's actually happening, not assumptions and guesses.
Blue is not chartreuse, and yellow is not white. Duh. Tell me...Why is pearl hot for Bondy right now? Don't know? There's your sign. be nice to know so the next time conditions match those in play now one knows what to do. Spend some time looking at your biats in high/low/very low light. |
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Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | Moltisanti - 11/17/2011 10:01 AM
Just my 2 cents, but "color doesn't matter, contrast does" makes about as much sense as saying, "I'm not a clown, I'm just dressed like one."
If you're on a bulldawg bite off of structure and one guy is nailing them on black/orange and the guy throwing a walleye dawg isn't getting bit, chances are the black/orange is more visible or enticing to the fish in that body of water. The contrast may be the 'why', but the color is the answer.
That's the issue. If you don't understand lure colors and how they are arrived at on any one bait, you are totally guessing at the contrast. Just saying 'green is hot' isn't good enough for me, and shouldn't be for you. How is orange made? What if the orange on one bait is red based, and yellow on another? What's the difference in what the muskie sees against the background being fished at the time? Don't know?
Interesting the number of folks insisting that learning more about what the muskie sees is stupid or irrelevant. Muskies use sight in the final portion of the attack...and at that point, it's EVERYTHING.
Yes, to another question, scientists have looked carefully at the muskie's eyes and have written volumes about what is believed they can see. Jerry Bucholtz also determined that the same structure that allows many critters to see in the UV spectrum is present in the muskie's eyes.
Ignorance is a really an odd thing to defend when so easily transformed to knowledge. |
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Posts: 906
Location: Warroad, Mn | Many years ago when I was a fishery bioligist I worked with Commercial Fisherman on the LOTWs using a Trawler to catch tullibees. We caught them by the ton! Here's a few things I remember about this. If we where in the middle of the big school of tullibees we hardly caught anything but tullibees. If we missed the big school and hit the edges of the school we would catch a good number of walleyes (some dandys), burbot, an occacional a northern pike. It seemed like the predators would skirt the edges, but wheren't in the middle of the school. Seen this many times. Then here's some of what I've found on the LOTWs. It's really not necessary to have bait fish in the area, as the fish that have found the bait fish have fed. What I'm looking for are the fish that haven't fed and they usually aren't where the're lots of bait fish. Could well be different on smaller lakes with every fish in the lake at this area. Doug Johnson |
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| Sworrall, It should be pointed out that at least one group of researchers would disagree with your statement that vision plays a crucial role at the end of the strike sequence for muskies. From New et al. (2001): "vision is used in the initial acquisition of the prey.... The lateral line system may play a critical role in the final capture of the prey at the end of the strike." The researchers demonstrated that vision (target acquisition) was used to initiate the strike sequence and the lateral line used to make fine-scale adjustments at the end of the strike. |
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| Just saying 'green is hot' isn't good enough for me, and shouldn't be for you. How is orange made? What if the orange on one bait is red based, and yellow on another? What's the difference in what the muskie sees against the background being fished at the time? the scientific method approaches these problems by attempting to prove hypotheses false, not trying to prove them true. if someone figures out that fish are preferring an orange bait and they're catching lots of big fish on it without knowing whether the color was derived from red dye instead of yellow, i suggest they've proven false that this knowledge is necessary. that, and they were probably too busy casting to sit in the boat frozen with indecision because they don't have the dye lot numbers for their lure paint. someone with a few big fish under his belt once said, "if it moves, it's food." i'd make a cast and get the bait moving. that probably provides some contrast against, well, everything. |
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Posts: 2865
Location: Brookfield, WI | Could a fisherman that believes in a bait color actually work that bait more effectively simply because he believes or hopes it will be successful? Or say you change colors. You're muskyhopeful the bait will be productive. Soon after putting it on, you're working the hell out of that thing, paying close attention. Pulling, yanking, cranking. Hard, soft, fast, slow. If you catch a keeper early in it's presentation, you might keep working that bait's hooks off, totally focused, really fishing with gusto. You get another keeper or two, and pretty soon you think that color is the one for you.
But say you change colors, fish that bait's hooks off. Really work that thing. But you don't catch any keepers. After a while, you're still throwing that bait, you've lost a little interest. You're kind of unhappy with the bait and don't even realize it. You've put a considerable amount of time in with it. You start to realize you're disillusioned. Your gaze wanders down to the old bait box, looking for something sexier. You decide it's time for a change. The bait you were throwing didn't work, even though maybe half the time it was in the water you weren't fishing it with the same verve. The zeal has waned. Your focus has withered.
So obviously that color doesn't work.
Then you change colors. You're revitalized and excited. You fish with renewed fervor.
And the circle continues.
Am I crazy? It's possible, maybe even likely. Do I know anything about fishing? Some might tell you no. Could I be on to something? Anything is possible. My theory? Fish hard with any color where the hungry fish are hanging out and you'll catch some keepers. Everybody likes to catch some keepers.
Kevin
Edited by MuskyHopeful 11/17/2011 7:36 PM
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Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | The final attack is generally accepted to be generated by sight. The 'end of the strike' as described by that piece refers to the absolute end of the sequence as the fish takes the bait following visual acquisition. As the fish gets very close at up to 35 mph, eye placement causes the bait to enter a 'blind spot'. I believe that piece addresses what happens in that split second.
My point is and was that without the visual, the rest of the sequence is not as likely. So we do not disagree at all.
'the scientific method approaches these problems by attempting to prove hypotheses false, not trying to prove them true.'
In your example, if one doesn't know what the actual footprint of that orange lure was (dark grey to almost black or light grey) there can be no hypotheses. It's tough to recreate something elsewhere if there is no understanding of what's happening down there in the first place.
I'd submit indecision, (and a huge pile of baits on the front deck at the end of the day) isn't caused by knowing, it's caused by NOT knowing, and the result is hit and miss. What to do when that orange lure no longer is working the magic? Why is one orange lure working and another is not? One needs no dye lot, one needs only a bit of in-advance-of-the-trip observation. Orange can be a dark contrast, or a light contrast in the underwater environment. Not much in between, but that's reality. I've shown that dozens of times holding what appear to be the same color lure in the light of day above the water in front of a bunch of somewhat surprised anglers after creating light conditions similar to that in the water at differing times of the day and differing time of year.
Light is a fickle medium. Light penetration in June at sun noon is not the same at sun noon in November.
One doesn't know what one doesn't know. I've always been a curious cuss, and it's made my fishing interesting because I want to know why something works when it works. Doesn't mean everyone has to be, but what possible reason can one offer to not want to know...other than 'I don't care' in which case, this conversation isn't for you. |
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| 3 pages of comments mostly about color instead of response to the original post.
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| In your example, if one doesn't know what the actual footprint of that orange lure was (dark grey to almost black or light grey) there can be no hypotheses. you failed to understand...my hypothetical was that there's a correlation between catching fish and knowledge of how the color looks underwater. what that lure actually looks like wasn't a part of it at all - it was about whether or not knowing such is related to catching fish.
there is a world of difference between "i don't care" and "this doesn't matter." many things are interesting and true but have no application. and some things might have an application but they're so esoteric as to render them useless. you don't catch fish gazing into your navel. |
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| canadachris you obviously haven't read this board for very long, man! This is a classic snapshot of what she's all about! Give it til the end of Happy Hour on Saturday night and this thread will be up to +/- five pages and then likely get frozen because the same handful of guys will just go on and on with "Listen To How Much Smarter I Am Than You Are." The original question---which is a good topic for this time of season---has very little to do with what will go on for pages afterward.
The real laugher is that the guys who have the most to say on threads like this are the ones who've never posted a fishing report or even fish at all, let alone spent many hours fishing around big schools of herring late in the fall lol. The guys who catch lots of fish and some really nice ones get other members riled up because their actual experiences fishing (SOME AS RECENT AS CATCHING A MUSKIE WITHIN THE LAST DECADE OVER THIRTY INCHES) is more valuable to the original poster than some dude hitting grounders from behind his keyboard because he caught a fish once and owns a bunch of muskie dvds where the hosts use the word 'cisco' more than ten times during an episode where all the leaves are off the trees. Almost to a man, the best and most consistent fishermen who frequesnt this board take the most flak, and it's almost invariably from guys who wouldn't know a muskie if they tripped over one. I don't think there's much disputing that point. All message boards are like that.
My 2 cents is herring, whitefish and lake trout do the bulk of their spawning at night and this occurs in waves. Most structures like shoals simply aren't big enough to service the millions of cisco trying to spawn all at one time, and lots won't spawn at all. Some hang in open water and wait, some are up spawning, some are already done, and some are getting eaten by gamefish. Marking nothing on the screen is just as good as tons of stuff, fish know where to wait for their food to arrive. Guys like Mike Lazarus, dougj, Howard wagner etc will all tell you that. I've had the rods go off many times with a blank screen. Wayne Gretzky scored all his goals being where the puck was going, not where it was right now. The fish lie in wait on structure and also loosly follow/stalk the giant schools of bait through open water all season. Pods of cisco that are "being worked" by predators are easy to recognize on your graph and you will even sometimes see them flipping out of the water. I've seen big lake trout work thru them late in the fall in shallow water. They bash them around with their tails and noses, circle back through and eat the ones that are hurt or stunned. Fascinating time of year to watch the food chain and like some of the regular fishermen have said already, if you pick a few good areas where muskies can meet the food, work those areas hard using a range of approaches.
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| JBush - 11/18/2011 3:50 AM
canadachris you obviously haven't read this board for very long, man! This is a classic snapshot of what she's all about! Give it til the end of Happy Hour on Saturday night and this thread will be up to +/- five pages and then likely get frozen because the same handful of guys will just go on and on with "Listen To How Much Smarter I Am Than You Are." The original question---which is a good topic for this time of season---has very little to do with what will go on for pages afterward.
The real laugher is that the guys who have the most to say on threads like this are the ones who've never posted a fishing report or even fish at all, let alone spent many hours fishing around big schools of herring late in the fall lol. The guys who catch lots of fish and some really nice ones get other members riled up because their actual experiences fishing (SOME AS RECENT AS CATCHING A MUSKIE WITHIN THE LAST DECADE OVER THIRTY INCHES) is more valuable to the original poster than some dude hitting grounders from behind his keyboard because he caught a fish once and owns a bunch of muskie dvds where the hosts use the word 'cisco' more than ten times during an episode where all the leaves are off the trees. Almost to a man, the best and most consistent fishermen who frequesnt this board take the most flak, and it's almost invariably from guys who wouldn't know a muskie if they tripped over one. I don't think there's much disputing that point. All message boards are like that.
My 2 cents is herring, whitefish and lake trout do the bulk of their spawning at night and this occurs in waves. Most structures like shoals simply aren't big enough to service the millions of cisco trying to spawn all at one time, and lots won't spawn at all. Some hang in open water and wait, some are up spawning, some are already done, and some are getting eaten by gamefish. Marking nothing on the screen is just as good as tons of stuff, fish know where to wait for their food to arrive. Guys like Mike Lazarus, dougj, Howard wagner etc will all tell you that. I've had the rods go off many times with a blank screen. Wayne Gretzky scored all his goals being where the puck was going, not where it was right now. The fish lie in wait on structure and also loosly follow/stalk the giant schools of bait through open water all season. Pods of cisco that are "being worked" by predators are easy to recognize on your graph and you will even sometimes see them flipping out of the water. I've seen big lake trout work thru them late in the fall in shallow water. They bash them around with their tails and noses, circle back through and eat the ones that are hurt or stunned. Fascinating time of year to watch the food chain and like some of the regular fishermen have said already, if you pick a few good areas where muskies can meet the food, work those areas hard using a range of approaches.
AMEN!!!!!!!.... You hit the nail right on the head! |
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| Jbush
I dont know about all this
BUT!!!
Mario Lemieux was better then Gretzky regardless of what color Jersey he was in !
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| That Gretzky line is classic. Good post JBush. |
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Location: The desert | Lemiux and Jagr > Messier and Gretzky |
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Location: Black Creek, WI | whynot - 11/18/2011 8:15 AM That Gretzky line is classic. Good post JBush. I agree!!! |
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| You just have to be careful exploiting one color. You don't want these fish to become conditioned.  |
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| JJ still puts a few in the net, too. Prime production for Jagr and lemieux was in a different era than Messier and Gretzky. Just like the era now is different, so I don't know if saying one guy was better than another when his prime was 80's and the other was 90's is all thyat valid. Lots changed from prime 99 era to prime 66 era, and Lemieux was vocal in bringing about a lot of it..The goaltending in 99's era was absolute junk for a lot of it, the 90's was marginally better and it's been revolutionized in the last five to seven years. I will check the stats but I'm pretty sure Gretzky had between 750 and 900 goals on Mike Liut and Greg Millen alone lol.
See canadachris, now we can switch gears and argue about hockey players for three solid pages lol! Seamless. I've trolled thru herring so thick the rods were jumping around in the holders from the lines smashing off 1/2 to 2lb fish. The wire twists etc on the leaders come back plastered with meat and scales. |
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| sworrall - 11/16/2011 11:24 PM
Too many variables to make up a chart. I reduce my lures to three classifications; dark, medium, and light.
Sounds like a chart, and possibly a great article. How did you build those classifications, and why does a particular lure fall into one or the other? Why/when/how do you choose what color classification to throw? Also, are there variations within the three classifications? Tell us about those variations and how they impact your color choice.
Seriously, I think you're full of it. I invite you to prove me wrong.
Also, everyone here knows that Pointer hasn't caught many fish, and has he ever caught a 50"+? Having a job in fisheries management does not make you a decent muskie fisherman when you have very little experience actually catching them. |
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Location: The desert | How do we know that Pointer hasn't caught many fish? |
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Location: Racine, Wi | Pointerpride102 - 11/18/2011 11:58 AM
How do we know that Pointer hasn't caught many fish?
Isn't it obvious? We've seen you fish. You like to lose them, not catch them.  |
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Location: The desert | tuffy1 - 11/18/2011 11:10 AM
Pointerpride102 - 11/18/2011 11:58 AM
How do we know that Pointer hasn't caught many fish?
Isn't it obvious? We've seen you fish. You like to lose them, not catch them. : )
There you go being an arrogant you know what again.
More specifically I think I like to watch the sucker on the graph and then watch a nice arc follow real close, for a good twenty minutes. I mean, why bother checking the rod? LOL!
Oh, and that brown was Josh's fault! |
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Location: Racine, Wi | Hahaha. Love it! And I'm not even talking about you know who this time.
Annnnd, that fish on the sucker was too small anyway. We didn't want anything under 50.
I think the brown was operator error, but we can discuss over a beer next time yer in town. Now go milk some trout DNR boy. |
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Location: The desert | I'm actually sitting in the land of crappy football right now, waiting for my plane to the land of Championship football. Heading to the Packers game Sunday. Catching an Admirals game tonight. |
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| so in other words your going to make like a defense men "and get the puck outta there" |
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Location: The desert | happy hooker - 11/18/2011 12:00 PM
so in other words your going to make like a defense men "and get the puck outta there"
I actually like the twin cities area, especially to see a Wild game. The area around the arena is top notch and really enjoyable. The inflatable football stadium is pretty lame though. |
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| Pointerpride102 - 11/18/2011 1:06 PM
I actually like the twin cities area, especially to see a Wild game. The area around the arena is top notch and really enjoyable. The inflatable football stadium is pretty lame though.
Once again, what does this have to do with fishing a cisco spawn? |
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Posts: 132
Location: Missouri | Anonymous - 11/18/2011 1:10 PM
Pointerpride102 - 11/18/2011 1:06 PM
I actually like the twin cities area, especially to see a Wild game. The area around the arena is top notch and really enjoyable. The inflatable football stadium is pretty lame though.
Once again, what does this have to do with fishing a cisco spawn?
About as much as 3/4ths of the post in this thread. |
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