Does Color Matter?

Does the color of my lure matter? If you've ever asked yourself this, you are in luck. Today we're diving deep into the world of color choice for frogs, buzzbaits, cranks, jigs, soft plastics, and much more on this episode of Tackle Talk. Hey there ladies and gentlemen, welcome to this episode of Tackle Talk. I am your steward. Andrew Hayes, today we're going to be diving all into the weeds when it comes to color choice for each and every kind of lure that you could possibly imagine. We're going to break this down into a couple different categories. We're going to start with top water. Then we're going to move into subsurface baits and then we're going to go to bottom contact baits. So, this isn't going to be a discussion or talking about just what colors work, what colors don't. We're going to really break it down. We're going to get into the weeds. I'm going to give my opinion on a lot of the stuff. Some of you may agree. Some may disagree. But I firmly believe that a lot of times the color of lures are meant to just empty your pockets and not necessarily help you become a better angler. I really want to dive into this topic and give my thoughts and opinions on what colors I like, what colors I don't like, what colors I think are necessary to keep in your box. Then also kind of breaking down each type of lure and how important is color. Why is it important? We're going to really get into this. First, I want to start with top water lures. I think the easiest and one to just get out of the way right away is frogs. I know we all know somebody that needs to hear this. So I'm going to say this loud and clear for those of you in the back. The color on top of the frog does not matter. Rewind that. Listen to it as many times as you need to pass it along to a friend that needs to hear it. And all. If you want to conduct your own extremely scientific research study at home, take a frog, hold it above your head right side up and then look up. If you can see the top of the frog, you either have x-ray vision or you did the experiment wrong. I know what you're saying. Oh, it's not very scientific. You need to do multiple studies with different controls and different variables and what. Just do it 10 times. Hold a frog over your head 10 times with the belly down and tell me how many times you can see the top of the frog. You can't. A fish is no different. At no point in your cast when it hits the water when you're working a frog does anything below the surface of the water. See the top of the frog. Really, and this is going to be a common theme. We're going to come back to back and forth in this episode. I really subscribe to the theory of when someone says like what color, what colors do you like, what colors work black and white. With moving baits, with top water baits, I subscribe to the black and white theory. You need a black frog and then you need a white frog or some sort of natural colored frog. Those are the only two color frogs you need. I promise you, I'm always looking for ways to kind of thin down the tackle that I take with me. I am very much a pack rat and I take way too much tackle. You can ask any of my buddies that go fishing with me. But this is a super easy way to trim the fat in an area where you can really get rid of all of this unnecessary tackle that you're buying. Have a black frog with you at all times. Have a white or natural frog, maybe a yellowish, whitish, greenish, underbelly, something like that. Those are the only two frogs you need. For some reason, I don't know if there's any science to this. If it's true or not, I've always found that on a very sunny day, black frogs typically work better. We're going to talk about this later, but this goes for a lot of different lures. But on a super sunny day, I think black frogs, black top water in general works very well. We're on a more cloudy day and more overcast day. I think you're going to want to opt for more of a natural color. I don't know if that's just because on a sunny day, the sun, where a fish is below the surface, the sun is beating down and all they see is black anyway because of the shadow. I don't know if in low light, they can just see the color of the underbelly a little bit better, where on a sunny day, like I said, all they're seeing is black and they're seeing the contrast from the sun. I have no idea. But that's my rule of thumb. I usually start on a sunny day with a black frog. And then if the fish are telling me otherwise, then I'll move to a more natural colored frog. But there's the only two colors you need. So I will say it again. Don't worry about the color. On top of your frog, the fish can't see it. It's just meant to sell you more lures. A black frog, a natural frog, we're done with frogs. I kind of think the same thing along the lines of if we're going to move to like poppers and spooks, kind of walking baits or popping baits. The only thing I'll give you with those is that I do think there might be a better argument that a fish or something below the surface can see the sides and maybe even the top sometimes of some of these baits for a popper, for instance. If you're working a popper and you're working it pretty hard, that popper is going to dig into the water when you chug it or when you make that pop. And then you can make the argument that a fish can see the top or the sides a little bit more when you're working a little bit harder through the water. Also think there's something to be said for the way that a fish tracks down or eats a popper or a spook as opposed to a frog. A frog, they're just going on pure instinct. They're blowing up on it. Very, very rarely are they going to follow this frog from Lily pad to Lily pad to Lily pad or to through the scum and then they're going to inspect it and get up on it. But that's really what happens, especially with poppers. You're going to have a popper that's going to be sitting up there. It's going to be imitating a dying baitfish, whatever it is. And a fish is really going to get up there. It's going to kind of nose it. It's going to look around before it decides, you know, one of these times, whatever we do, the cadence, the pause, the next motion for some reason just triggers something in that fish's mind to strike it. And it says, okay, I'm going to commit. But until then, it really is, I don't know, I think it inspects it a little bit more than some other lures. So for that reason, I guess I get a little bit how you can make an argument that maybe the paint job on the sides of the top of a popper or spook matters a little bit. I'm still really going to subscribe to the theory that you need a black popper, a black spook, and then you need a white or shad colored popper and a shad colored spook or a bone spook, something like that. That's really all I think you need. You don't necessarily need all of these crazy looking colors. You could make the argument, I guess, if you're in a big perch lake or something like that, then okay, you get a perch pattern, a fire tiger pattern, something like that. Or, you know, there's a reason that I think it was heading made those little mini spooks and mini torpedoes and a frog pattern. You can make that argument too, that okay, you know, you want to keep a frog pattern, spook, or a frog pattern, popper in your bag. That's fine. But really, I really think all you need is a natural color of some sort and then a black popper. And then I use the same kind of theory there too. Or on a sunny day, I'll start with a black popper. I'm a big fan of black top water baits in general. I think they are very underrated. I think they don't get the love that they should. Just a plain black popper, a plain black spook does wonders, especially in dirtier water or like I said, on super sunny days, they're not to be overlooked. The next thing I kind of want to move forward, I think the last thing we'll probably touch on in top water is going to be a whole different beast. It's going to be buzz baits or constantly moving top water. So like a lot of you guys, I know you throw a wapper ploppers all the time. We're going to lump that all in kind of the same thing where it's a moving bait up top that is really meant to just entice a reaction strike. And I think that the original theory still applies. I think I would probably keep a black top water like buzz bait or a wapper plopper. I would also keep a white or shad color. This is why when people recommend wapper ploppers got huge the past couple of years. So I'll use them as an example because I feel like a lot of you have them. A lot of you can relate. There's a reason that when you ask someone for a recommendation on a color, the two most popular colors are the, I think it's called loon. That's the main black one with a little bit of, I think white accent in it. And then there's bone, which is kind of a white slash off white color. And it's again, it's just because you need a black top water. You need a more natural, shad imitation top water. But I will say that I think color on buzz baits doesn't really matter too much at all. I really think you could get away with throwing any color you wanted. You could put a pink skirt on it. You could put a sharp, true skirt on it. You could have whatever you want because again, what's really getting that fish to hit is pure instinct of the noise, the water displacement that this is causing. And all it sees is as like an intruder or something that it wants to attack. So I really don't think color is as important with something like a buzz bait because the reaction time is so quick. They're making a split second decision on whether or not they're going to chase this thing down and hit it where a popper or a frog or something is a little bit more of a delicate process where okay, they're, they're going to see a little bit more of it before they commit to, to take it. So on a buzzbait, I don't really think you can go wrong. I think sometimes with buzzbaits, one of the things that's really under- underestimated is the color of the blade as opposed to the color of the skirt. I think the color of the blade makes a big difference. So, you know, on some days you're gonna want to use a silver blade on that. Some days you're gonna want to opt for a gold. And then there are sometimes that you might want to go with a painted blade too. You see some now that are painted white or painted black. And then there's other little nuances there too that I think are a lot more important than color like if it has a clacker or not. Or if it's squeaks when it goes by. One of my buddies actually taught me this. He always takes us at a pliers and he crimps that little metal cylindrical piece that's right below the blade, right where the wire makes that kind of 90 degree turn where it finishes out the wire on the buzzbait. So if you trace the wire all the way from hook all the way around the buzzbait at the very end there's gonna be a little cylindrical piece that kind of buffers the contact between the blade and that right angle. And he crimps that and he says and you know I believe I'm not seeing it work. The squeak that that makes or the sound that it makes for some reason really pisses fish off. So that's something I think is a little bit more important than color especially with a fast moving bait is just you know little nuances like that. So don't get hung up on your buzzbaits or your whopper ploppers things like that on the color of them. I don't necessarily think it's too much. That fish is gonna either chase it down or it's not. I don't think it's gonna waver because of the color of the lure. So now we're going to get into subsurface baits and I think probably what we're gonna see is when we go from top water to subsurface to bottom baits. I personally believe that color gets more important as we go into this conversation. I think top water is probably least important for color choice of your lure and then subsurface. It's gonna get a little bit more important but it depends on what subsurface lure you're throwing. So we're gonna start with the obvious one we're gonna start with crankbaits. Now I'm gonna try and cover this really broadly of my thoughts on it because there's a million different kinds of crankbaits. There's you know a DTs that dive all the way to the bottom of the middle of the lake and then there's your tiny little finesse square bells that you throw in two feet of water. I'm gonna try and encompass this all in one without having to break it down because it's just, that seems daunting to go through each kind of crankbait. But I think with crankbaits, I think more important than color is the action of it and what you're trying to do with it. So more times than not you're trying to take a crankbait and you're trying to deflect it off of either the bottom of whatever you're fishing which is a lot of times usually rock or you're trying to deflect it off of wood or you deflect it off of lay downs, like that. So I think that is a lot more important than the color but I do think the color choice has its place because I think it needs to be able to be seen. Again, we'll start with the basics. I think you know you need a shad colored crankbait or some sort of natural color crankbait. I don't really think you need a shad, a gizzard shad, a blue gill, a redier sunfish, a you know all the different kinds of shell cracker pattern. Like I don't think you need all those. I think you just need one kind of natural pattern that you can get away with throwing in clear water, semi stained water. Once you get really stained then you're going to want to change your color choice probably. But just something that looks kind of natural. One of my favorite crankbait colors is a croppy pattern. Just kind of white with black spots on it and that works for me. I really like it but then I don't necessarily keep like a whole bunch of regular shad colored ones because that's the one I like. That's the color I'm going with when I know a natural color will work. You don't need 50 different natural colors of crankbait. I really don't think when something's bouncing off of water bouncing off the bottom, the tiny little nuances on the specs of color that are on this thing really matter. I just think you need something that looks kind of natural. And then you know you'll move to something that you need for stained water. That's a little different. Some people really like sharp-choose crankbaits. Some people really like darker crankbaits like you will go with a black or something super dark. Honestly I don't think it matters too much. I think both of those probably have their merit to keep in your boxes. I don't use a sharp-choose crankbait a whole bunch but I know a lot of people that swear by them and love them. I've also heard that, and again I don't know if this is true or not. I'm not a scientist by any means. But I have heard that a lot of times fish see sharp-choose as white. So I don't know if sharp-choose just shows up a little better in stained water but still kind of looks natural. That might be a selling point for it. I'd have to do a little bit more research on it. I don't know if that's an old wives tale or not. That's what I've heard that fish a lot of times see sharp-choose as white. So you know, sharp-choose then in that theory would probably be a good choice for stained water where you still want something to look natural. And then I do think there's probably a place in your tackle box for a super dark colored crankbait of some sort. If we're going to move to chatterbaits, sort of similar thing applies. But honestly with a chatterbait, I really think you only need two colors and it's going to take us back to what we talked about earlier. It's going to be, you need a really dark color for stained water and you need a natural looking color for semi-stained to clear water. My two favorite colors, I always keep a green pumpkin chatterbait with me. It just, it imitates a blue-gill well and imitates a crawl that's fleeing really well. Green pumpkin is just kind of an all-encompassing color. So you can't go wrong with that. So I would keep a green pumpkin color and then I would keep like a black and blue. And that's going to really cover all of your bases. You don't need the different nuances of watermelon red flake or the blue-gill pattern or all that kind of stuff. Just pick one that looks that you like that's a natural color and then something that's dark. Again, we'll go back to what we talked about with crankbaits. I've heard a lot of people say that they like the white and chartreuse chatterbaits too and they use those for stained water. Fine. Whatever works for you honestly is perfectly fine. If your natural colored chatterbait is a white and you want to imitate a shadow little better as opposed to keeping a green pumpkin around, fine. It doesn't matter. But you need a natural color. You need a color to use for stained water too. And then if we're going to get into some other subsurface lures, maybe like a swimbait. Swimbaits I think are going to be a lot different because when you're throwing a swimbait, I think it comes more down to matching the hatch. That term itself kind of makes me grimace because it's so overused and so cliche. But honestly, if you're going to throw a little paddletail swimbait for instance, just on a ballhead jig and you're going to throw around here, big joshy swimbaits are huge. Some other places people use the chitech fat impact or the swing impacts, whatever they're called. But whatever you're throwing like with a soft swimbait, I think really most of the time you're going to go with something that's gray or green pumpkin or something that just looks natural. Very rarely I think you're going to want to throw something super, super, super dark. Just because I think if the water is that muddy and you're throwing something like a swim bait, I think there's probably better options because most of the time I'm going to want to displace a little bit more water if it's super murky water color just because I don't have a whole lot of confidence in having a fish be able to find a really small finesse curly tail or paddle tail swimbait and just chocolate milk water. I want something that has maybe a blade on it or something a little bit more aggressive wobble. That's when you're crankbaits or your little chatterbaits or something like that's going to come into play a little bit more. So for a paddle tail swimbait, I do think it probably matters a little bit more your color choice than it would for a chatterbait or a crankbait because those are a little bit more reaction strike. Paddle tail swimbaits a little bit more of a finesse tactic where a fish can kind of come up on it and inspect it a little bit and take a better look at it. It's not necessarily deflecting off a bunch of stuff and just causing them to go off pure instinct. So after that, the I don't really know a whole lot about hard swimbaits. I'm going to be completely honest. It's just not something I throw very often, but I would assume the same thing applies for hard swimbaits as it is for soft swimbaits because you're not working them super fast. If you're throwing a glide bait or you're throwing some sort of big joint in the swimbait, it's going to be worked a little slower in the water. So a fish is going to get a little bit better look at it and then maybe color pattern matters a little bit more. I don't know. I honestly don't know much about giant swimbaits. I wish I did. I think it'd be a lot of fun to throw. I just live in South Central Ohio where it's not super realistic to throw those all the time. So one of the last things we are going to get into is going to be the bottom contact baits. And this is where I think color is going to matter a lot more. But before we get to that, we have a quick announcement from Mystery Tackle Box. Do you like catching fish? Do you like using cool new lures to catch those fish? Then look no further than the Mystery Tackle Box. From day one, Mystery Tackle Box has been on a mission to ensure that the best baits in the industry end up on your doorstep each and every month. With over three million boxes shipped and counting, Mystery Tackle Box is truly the number one fishing subscription box on the market. For more information, head on over to www.mysterytacklebox.com. All right. Go check those guys out. Go check those out. Go support them. They've been a big supporter of me. They're great guys. They do some great work with just Mystery Tackle Box with Carl's Baton Tackle, the Catch Company, all those guys are fit. So go get me check. So where were we? Oh Bottom contact base. So we are going to dive into the weeds now and We're gonna start I think with jigs. Jigs are maybe one of my favorite lures to throw ever if you put a gun to my head And you said hey, you got to pick one lure for the rest of your life. What's the throwing? It's probably gonna be a jig With that being said, I think the color of jigs matters a lot. I have seen The difference just you know a couple strands of a different color can make with fish Particularly in certain bodies of water. I think I've found that there's certain bodies of water that Certain colors just work more often than not and I don't necessarily know if it has a whole lot to do with a natural Forage because a lot of the places that I'm thinking about right off the top of my head I know have the exact same cross and I'm there, you know a mile apart, but I do know that there's certain color patterns I like to use at certain lakes or certain rivers that I don't necessarily use it others just because I found that they work So with jigs obviously one that you're gonna want to keep in your Back pocket is green pumpkin jig everybody knows that I don't feel like I need to to hound you with the importance of keeping a natural color like a green pumpkin on the deck of your boat. I think it's pretty self-explanatory and You would be surprised in how dirty of water you can get away with throwing a natural jig Jigs themselves especially when you're throwing a trailer on it like some sort of Crawl trailer or some sort of creature bait They've got a little bit of movement to them. So these these people can find or these fish can find the lure a lot better than I think we give them credit for they've also got big bulky skirts on them. So I really think that a lot of times I get kind of wussy and I start to Grab darker colors or colors that I feel like you're gonna show up a lot better way too Cautiously, I think I need to learn to Stick with natural colors more in dirtier water. It's just a confidence thing But I just know they work. So get your natural color jigs I also think different times a year different color jigs are gonna work pretty well So in the in the spring anyway, I always keep some sort of red colored jig with me There's just something about red in the spring and fall to but mostly spring around here that just drives fish Absolutely bonkers. I don't know if that's the color that craws Naturally look like in the spring when they're molting. I have no idea But there's just something about red that really sets these fish off That's why you hear a lot of people a lot of times talk about red lipless cranks and red crankbaits in the spring too So I would keep a red jig just in case maybe even some sort of combination of the two and then obviously The old standby you talk to old geezers. They're gonna talk about the black and blue jig as maybe the most versatile Lure in the history of lures and I love a black and blue jig too I always keep one with me you can throw it in the dirtiest of water You can also get away with throwing it in pretty clear water There's just something about it that that fish love. It's a it's a classic for a reason aside from those Something I think that gets overlooked quite a bit is throwing like a white or a white and gray flipping jig too It looks like a shad that just came down from the surface and is dying for some reason when we think of jigs We think of more crawl color and we we don't really give the respect that we need to have in a shad color jig People do it all time swim jigs, but when you're flipping a jig or you know going into cover something like that Don't overlook throwing like a you know an all white jig or like I said a white and silver flash something like that It's it's something that's definitely worth a spot in your tackle box. Other than that It's it's more trial and error, but I do think that that color matters For jigs a lot more you're gonna throw it down there It also depends I guess on what you're doing with the jig if you're flipping then maybe color not so much because they are Reacting pretty quick. They're not getting a really good look at that bait But if you're dragging it or you're throwing a finesse jig and you're just hopping off the bottom or you know really working it pretty slowly Then you know, I would argue that a jig and what we'll get to in a second with like Texas rigs and stuff probably when color is gonna come into play the most another thing obviously you have to think of is What the natural forage and what you're throwing is and one of the best ways you can do it honestly is turn over some rocks and Take like a butterfly net with you. I do this all the time I look like an idiot, but it helps me so much just take a like a butterfly net get like a dollar tree one And then take it with you and go it especially you river guys Start flipping over rocks and just wave that thing under there and pick up some crawdads and look and see what color they are And then really go try and find a jig that matches that or find someone that does custom jigs that can you can send a picture to and say hey You know, can you make me some jigs that look like this color and you'd be surprised Dude, there's people all over the internet that can do that do it for three or four bucks a jig. I do it myself And I think it's fun to try and match those pictures and it's really rewarding so If we're gonna move on to Texas rigs kind of the same thing applies if you're throwing a Texas rig a fish is gonna Get a really really good look at whatever you're throwing at it So that means being extremely conscious about what color you're throwing how it shows up and then you know if you're throwing A crawl day a soft, you know a Texas rig crawl or something you're like man, they should be eating this switch up the color I have a really good example. It was maybe three or four weeks ago Me and my buddy Jeff were at a lake that we go to quite a bit I know there's big fish in there and he was just absolutely whooping my ass and we're both throwing like quarter ounce Kind of finesse jigs and he was just wearing them out on what I kind of consider my home lakes. I was getting a little Discurreds about it and I like paddled over to him. We're both in kayaks I looked at his jig and his jig had just a tiny little strand of red in it and that was it and his Soft plastic they had on the back was just some bargain bin like black green pumpkin and red Craw and so sure shit. I tie on one of my Kind of I call him black cherry but kind of like a red colored jig I put a rage crawl on the back to had a little bit of red flake in it and just started getting annihilated and again It was just something to do with the color that day. I don't know what it was But it turned them on and they were just absolutely Wear me out and I think that was one of the the points where I was like okay Just a tiny little adjustment of color for for a finesse bait like that especially just makes the all the difference in the world I you know, I really can't stress enough that I think Color matters in certain situations and I think as you go down the water column and down the You know the list there like we talked about top water I don't really think it matters too much just because a lot of those are reaction strikes They can't see most of the the lure anyway and then when you get into the subsurface I think it matters a little bit because you have to make sure that it shows up and that it looks semi-natural And then when you get to bottom baits I think it becomes super important because the fish are getting a chance to inspect it They are gonna go up. They're gonna knows that they're gonna take a look at it and make sure that it looks like something that They're ready to commit to so I guess kind of like at 30,000 feet. That's my view on colors color patterns Which ones are worth it which ones aren't and and when it's important So I hope this kind of helps some of you let me know what you guys think obviously I love when people disagree with me because we can have you know Fun conversations about why I love I'm not too ignorant to think that I can't you know Still have a lot to learn about fishing so let me know in the comments or just get a hold of me And let me know what you think about this and if I was right if I was wrong you guys decide but I Really appreciate you guys tuning in we are gonna try and do this weekly So again, I promise that we'd keep this to around 30 minutes. I'm gonna keep that promise Thank you very much for listening and we are excited to talk to you next time on the next episode of Tackle Talk Thank you for listening to the Tackle Talk podcast Tackle Talk is produced by Andrew Hayes copyrights 2019 Please subscribe to Tackle Talk and Apple podcasts Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts