Color really does matter

Fishermen sometimes wonder if color really does make a difference. Recently, we found out that it does. Fishing for crappie, my friend Brent and I worked a bank using different lures without success. However, when I put on a smoke colored twister tail jig, I started catching fish.

Brent, who had been using a white jig switched to a smoked color jig and started picking up fish as well. We worked the same banks we had just moments before, but this time we caught fish.

Of course, this wasn't the first time I have seen a difference in using different colored lures and it made a big difference in catching fish or going home with an empty stringer.

Larry Thomas, Independence, Independence, is one of those anglers who uses the same lure no matter what. However, on a recent trip to Pomme de Terre, I was catching a crappie on nearly every cast using a small Crappie Slider.

Thomas was using a yellow jig and he never caught a fish all morning. It was only after I convinced him to try the same kind of lure I was using that he caught a fish. "I never thought color would make that much difference," he said. "I still wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it in person."

Even the trout in Taneycomo prefer different color at different times. Marty Davis, Springfield said, "Last week, I was looking for trout and a friend told me he caught his limit the day before on green jigs. I tried them for awhile without any hits so I changed to a bright red jig and started catching fish.

"It proved to me that you need to be flexible to catch fish. One lure doesn't catch all the time. I guess you could say you can catch fish with one lure some of the time and you can catch different species of fish some of the time, but you can't catch all kinds of fish with the same lure all of the time."

Bob Martin, Blue Springs, is a Zara Spook angler and catches a lot of big bass on this lure. Martin said, "I never thought much about the color of a Spook making a difference because I always thought it was the action that attracted the bass. Wrong!

"While fishing a windy point on Table Rock recently, I wasn't doing any good using a silver Spook. When I changed to a black color Spook, I started picking up fish. Same lure, same action, but different color. It really does make a difference."

Virgil Ward, one of the really good fisherman I have fished with, proved to me years ago how much difference color makes. We were fishing Table Rock using spinners.

Ward was picking up bass, but I wasn't. He was using a black skirt on his single spin while I was using yellow. He handed me a black skirt and said, "Try this on your spinner as see if it helps." I did and two casts later, I had my first bass of the day.

Anglers know that some days it doesn't seem to matter what you throw at the fish, you may catch one on nearly every cast or you might fish all day and not get a strike. Ward had an answer for those days you aren't doing to well.

His tackle box looked like something out of a Technicolor movie. There were the colors of the rainbow plus many more.

His jigs, spinners and other baits were a mixture of colors. If one color wasn't working, he would try another until he found the one that worked. It paid off for him and it will for you if you try it.

Ward said, "Many fishermen stay with one color and some of the time it might be the right one, but if it isn't, they never change and they doesn't catch fish. I found out long ago that you need to be flexible to be able to catch fish on most of your trips. There are days however when nothing works."

Even now, when late spring fishing is going strong, color makes a difference. Jim Knowles, Joplin, was fishing for crappie at Stockton and when he wasn't catching fish using a blue and white jig, he changed to a yellow jig and started catching fish.

"I thought that crappie would hit anything when you find them, but I saw the difference color makes," he said.