Color Selection

Color Selection
— by Roger Lee Brown (The Bass Coach)

How many of you anglers who walk into Tackle Shops, Discount Stores, K-Marts, Wal-Marts, etc., go straight to the sporting goods department, look for the fishing rods sticking up in the air to zero in on the Fishing Lures and Plastic Baits section?


Then, when you get there you start looking over all of the enormous selections of all the different baits and different colors that are offered by the many bait companies that are on the market today, and you’re not really sure of exactly what is really needed, so "The Big Question" comes to mind; "What colors do I really need?" especially when looking over all the plastic baits.

Well, let me tell you a little secret that most anglers don’t know!, and that is; "You don’t need a multitude of colors in your arsenal." That’s right! and let me say it again..... "You don’t need every color that you see!." Now, some anglers may suggest the comment; "well my partner and I use this certain color on this certain body of water, and it catches a lot of bass" or others may say; "I saw this magazine article from one of the top Pros, and he said to use this; yellow, spotted, half stripped, 7", curly tail, floating, thing-a-ma-jig plastic made by so & so, and I saw a picture in the magazine of the 14 lb. bass he caught off of this certain plastic bait, and now I’ve really got to have some of these." Now before we get started, let me explain something to you. The Bassin’ Industry is a "Multi-Billion Dollar Industry" in today's world and growing more and more every day. Most of the Pros that lecture these "Bass Seminars" have an obligation to their sponsors to demonstrate, promote, and to advertise their sponsored product (Nobody gives anything for free anymore!).

For example, attend one of their fishing seminars and just see if they don’t try to sell you on a "certain product", or the technique that they may use with this "certain bait." There are more Outdoor TV Fishing Shows, Outdoor Magazines (related to freshwater fishing), Bass Tournament Organizations, Bass Fishing Sites (on the World Wide Web), Bass Fishing Clubs, Bait and Tackle Manufacturers, Bass Boat Manufacturers, Rod Companies, Reel Companies, and it goes on and on and on, as there ever was before. (That’s probably why Bass Fishing is considered to be America’s #1 freshwater sport!) And ALL! of these companies are in the market to make money.

Now, let’s go even a step further, okay? What sells all of these products? Hmm, let’s see now, advertisement (Marketing) and promotion are about the two best ways of selling a product that I’m aware of and I’m sure that there are more, but first let’s concentrate on these two for just one moment. Let’s talk about fishing shows to give you an example! I’ve co-hosted several TV Fishing shows in the past and let me tell you that "Most,"of the time, (Not All!) but "Most" of the fish that you see being caught on the show are caught prior to the actual filming of a show. Yep! now you might ask yourself; "well I saw the guy set his hook and then reel in the bass." All I can say to you is this; "Don’t believe everything that you see!" with today’s editing equipment, professional camera personnel, and the right camera shots anything is possible. So let me explain how it works; #1, you cast out the sponsored bait product (whatever bait or baits the show is sponsored by, keeping in mind that the fish were actually caught prior to the show, and in most cases on totally different bait). #2, while you start your retrieve, you rare back with your rod like you just got a strike and pretend to set the hook! (on actually nothing at all). Then the camera will stop filming. #3, then, you simply reel your sponsored bait back in to the boat, grab a fish (in the case of a bass show, a bass) out of the livewell and place the hook of the "sponsored product" in the fish’s mouth. #4, Next you place the fish back into the water (with ease, and always keeping the slack out of your line), then you let the fish swim away from the boat. #5, then at this time, the camera starts rolling again and starts filming you fighting the fish back to the boat!...(Really quite simple!) That’s how Most! of the filming is done.

It’s not so much the bait, or color, or technique used to catch the bass during the filming, they just want to show you how much bass all of these "certain baits" can actually catch! (but do they really?), that’s called Marketing, OR!, take a look at the packages of most of the baits today. They have to look appealing on the shelves to


the consumer (this is called Packaging). Just keep this in mind!, most baits on the market today are made and packaged to catch anglers and not so much the fish.

Now, I’m telling you this because of all the different products and especially all the multitude of COLORS that you must decide on which ones to buy. Okay, let’s get back to the colors...... First of all I want you to understand that I am NOT saying that a certain color of a plastic bait will or will not work under any different circumstances, but I will say that you don’t really need no more than approximately 2 dozen colors of plastics to catch bass on any body of water throughout the United States. Now stop and think a minute! There are, without exaggeration, on today’s market thousands of colors and combinations of colors when it comes to plastic baits. Remember what I just said! I said only 2 dozen colors, and not hundreds of different colors!, whew!, what a money saver, Right!..... And, if you usually fish deeper than 20’ depths most of the time, you don’t even need to have that many colors. The reason is, is because the deeper a colored bait drops through the water it starts to loose the color of the bait itself. That’s right, the deeper it goes down into the water the color spectrum starts to diminish. In other words, if you had a multi-colored plastic worm and you cast it out letting it drop to a 25’ depth, the colors of that multi-colored plastic worm would be "Shades of Grays and Blacks" in that depth of water.

Just like scuba diving, when you get down to a certain depth everything looks Black and White!, well the same goes for colored plastics (Now, how many colors does an angler actually need when fishing these deeper patterns?) It doesn’t matter what color you throw into 20’ plus depths because "All Colors" will basically all look the same on the bottom. The only difference now will be is your shade variations.

So, why buy hundreds of different colors of plastic baits when they will all loose their color at deeper depths? (Makes no sense to me!) So there is a lesson to learned!, probably the most important factor to keep in mind when fishing with plastics is; "The Presentation" of the bait is what really counts! and not so much the color....... I teach my students presentations, techniques, as well as colors that they can use anywhere so they can be highly effective when it comes to catching bass on any body of water!

For more information on colors, baits, presentations, techniques, equipment, and just about anything you might want to learn about bass fishing, you owe it to yourselves to enroll into my 3-Day "On-Water" Bass Fishing School. You will not only learn what equipment, baits, and bass related items are really necessary to have but also how much money you can actually save yourselves by knowing what not to buy when it comes to baits and equipment.

Till next time! Take Care and God Bless!....."The Bass Coach"