Fishing Breakthrough or Industry Gimmick?

Fishing results bear out Jones’ findings: When you’re after finicky bass in clear open water, fluorocarbon gets you more bites. And the thinner the line, the better. Today’s fluoros are supple enough to spool on a spinning reel, though many anglers prefer to use a braided mainline, attaching a fluorocarbon leader from 3 to 12 feet long, depending on personal preference. Some feel that getting a full wrap or two of fluorocarbon on the spool limits knot breakage at boatside.

Camouflage or Contrast?

Fluorocarbon line tends to blend with the background in clear, open water due to its refractive index. Whether a line contrasts or blends with the background is perhaps the most important factor in its visibility. Transparent blue lines are likely the ones best disguised in clear, open water. And in waters with a reddish hue, red lines may indeed be least visible.

“Red becomes least visible when it’s camouflaged by a prevailing red background,” Jones says. “In impoundments with red clay banks, red particles are suspended in the water. Light disappears quickly in these conditions, but red wavelengths penetrate deepest. Against this reddish background, red line is well camouflaged. The same thing occurs in tannic-stained water. Similarly, if you found a chartreuse-colored lake, perhaps dyed by a bloom of blue-green algae, chartreuse line would be least visible.”

The concept of contrast is important when selecting lure color, as well. While anglers typically want their lines to blend with the background and not be obvious to fish, moving baits should contrast to draw bass’ attention. A dark lure on a dark bottom when seen from above, or a green lure viewed from the side against a weedy backdrop, is camouflaged and may go unseen. Against a green backdrop of hydrilla, though, a red rattlebait tipping the top of the grass offers excellent contrast that triggers bites from active bass.

Over a dark bottom, bass more easily notice a dark spinnerbait with a chartreuse trailer because of its contrasting colors. That sort of partial camouflage creates an image that’s hard for bass to identify but easy for them to find, generally a good thing. Other pairs of colors that stimulate both sets of cone cells, like blue and yellow or green and orange, make lures easier to detect.

That theory has played out well in the field. I’ve had great success with those particular combinations on worms, jigs, and crankbaits in clear and stained water. A junebug ring worm with a chartreuse tail is a perennial killer, while a green pumpkin jig backed by an orange Guido Bug is hard to beat. And a yellow-sided crankbait with a blue back is one of my all-time favorite patterns.

Judging by recent product introductions, the red phenomenon is not going away anytime soon. From the orange Carrot Stix rod from E21, to red jighooks and sinkers, consumers want more red gear. And they’ll get it.

Dr. Jones suggests that red tackle can provide advantages in certain fishing situations—in others, it may be disadvantageous; and sometimes it doesn’t matter. The best strategy lies in understanding how water color and depth affect the visibility of lines, lures, and tackle. For more information check Jones’ book, Knowing Bass, at globepaquot.com, a division of Lyons Press.

*Keith Jones, Spirit Lake, Iowa, is Director of Research at Pure Fishing. He has a Ph.D. in biology from Texas A&M University and fishes for bass and other species across the U.S.