RyanCastin

Also wanted to recommend the book: Through the Fish’s Eye: An Angler’s Guide to Gamefish Behavior. It is filled with factual scientific information about largemouth bass as well as almost every other popular game fish. It can be bought on Amazon very cheap. This book tremendously improved my knowledge of fish biology, ecology, and behavioral ecology. I highly recommend this book to anybody who is interested in learning A LOT more about aquatic ecosystems. It is a great book to start with if you are looking to get into some scientific information about your favorite game fish!

Thanks I am graduating from Regis University! I am also in the front range area, maybe we can get out and fish sometime!

I completely agree with this! Bass, like all creatures a very adapted to their environments and use many different sensory queues than us humans use. However, with studies of the bass' behavior and reactions to different colors (or in this case, shades of a color) we can get a feel for how bass perceive color. Knowing that most bait fish are also adapted to their environments (and predators), they have evolved camouflages to help evade predators. However, in response to this bass have evolved advanced strategies to help detect these camouflaged colors. Therefore, my hypothesis would be that the colors bass are most attracted to are colors that are easily perceivable or colors which they have adaptations to detect. I would start simple with some normal phrases like "largemouth bass" and if that doesn't work use their scientific name "Micropterus salmoides" followed by words that you are interested in learning about such as "behavior", "adaptations", "feeding", "foraging", etc. This should give you lots of results. Also entering just the species name will bring up every study (in the database) that mentions those words.

There are many great sources. If you can get access to your wifes academic logins, the library for the school should have access to many large databases. I use my schools library databases and go to the biological sciences or ecological sciences databases and there will be hundreds or even thousands of articles depending on the keywords you put in. Hope that helps! If you need more info I can see if there are any free databases for the public to access!

Also, with more depth the bright green likely appears as darker shades of green at greater depths. Eventually it would appear as black at certain depths as only 25% of light penetrates into depths of 10m. Congrats to you too! And yeah environmental classes can be tough, luckily i've had some great professors at Regis University. Also for the major I've had to take lots of biology and ecology courses.

Not so sure about chartreuse because it wasn't mentioned in the section, however I would imagine that it appears as a bright green as it mixes with the green and/or blue light that penetrates the water.

Sorry for the few typos - I was trying to get a lot of information down quickly.

Hello everybody! Being a bass angler who is also an environmental science major (graduating this year), I am very intrigued to hear the scientific information regarding to LMB behavior and ecology! To start the thread I am currently in a freshwater ecology class, in our massive textbook there was a section on water color in relation to productivity of the lake. Crystal blue lakes are not as productive (in terms of the whole ecosystem) as green or brown waters. These differences in water colors mean that there are differences in spectral quality with depth (light does not penetrate the same in different water colors - and therefore, colors are perceived differently at each depth).This section was followed by a short section about fishing lures. It stated that the colors of our lures are almost never perceived the same as they are to us once. As an example, red lures are still perceived as red lures appear as red because they absorb the blue and green light while reflecting red. BUT, red light does not penetrate deep into lakes. Therefore to a diver or fish in 5 meters of water a red lure would appear black. Lures also are perceived as different colors in oligotrophic lakes and eutrophic lakes (this depends on the productivity of the lake and therefore, color of the water). A white lure would be perceived as blue 10 meters under the surface in a oligotrophic lake but would appear green in a eutrophic lake 1 meter under water. This is due to the predominant spectrum of light that reaches different depths. Therefore, colors of lures are more designed to appeal to us as fisherman rather than the fish themselves. I am not saying that certain colors don't appeal more to fish, but they do not perceive them the same as we think they do - specifically with more depth, the colors typically show to the fish as black. This gives me a reason to think why reflective clear/white lures are so effective at any depth - the reflection (resembling fish scales) attracts the fish more than the color.

Thank you Paul! Being an environmental science major (graduating this year) I love to hear and rely the scientific explanations of bass behavior and ecology. What part of Colorado are you in? Ryan

New to this thread and very interested. What are the key differences between old glass and cane rods to modern rods? How do the "actions" of these rods work? Are they typically all a "slow" or "moderate" (full rod bend) action or do they have various different actions like modern rods? How do you decide lengths on these types of rods? Also have similar questions for these vintage reels but can get more in depth on that later. Thanks, Ryan

What do you guys fish if waters are just above freezing temp? Colorado winters fluctuate drastically with a week or two of 50-60 degree weather going right back down to snow and less than 20-30 degrees. Our lakes are constantly freezing and thawing back out.

Thanks for the advice! I mostly fish smaller ponds with maximum depth of about 10-20 feet. I mostly am wondering what to look for as structure and if I should focus on moving baits or slow baits. Appreciate the help!

I live in Colorado and we have been having a very mild winter here. Most of our lakes have already thawed out and the water temp is in the mid 40s. Looking to see if anybody has some tips on locating these cold water bass and baits to use, etc. Obviously fishing slow is key in cold water but I'm looking for some more knowledge on where these bass will be hanging out in the cold weather as well as some different baits to try.

I agree with this. Retrieving perpendicular or 45 degree angle to the shore is key in areas with thick vegetation along the shorelines.

I have fished in florida a few times and I know how dense those grass mats are. When I am fishing there in Lake Seminole by my dads house, I have good luck casting perpendicular to the edge of the grass mats and retrieving it as close to those mats as possible. Also I stuck to using top water / sub top water lures and had a great deal of luck.

Thanks roadwarrior! That is a bit of a drive from me but maybe ill have to make a trip down there this weekend!

Thanks A-Jay! What part of Michigan are you in? My mom moved out there and lives near Lake St. Clair. I did some fishing up there in the summer and got on some good largies but no smallies surprisingly.

Im from Denver as well and would love to go out and catch some bass with you off the kayaks! Im new to kayak fishing but have caught some 3-4 pounders off mine on a private lake.

Looking to find some fishing buddies on this app who love bass fishing as much as I do! Ive gotten really into targeting largies but don't know many people who are as into it as me!

Ive seen some lakes and ponds in the North Denver suburbs have already thawed out and look fishable. Anybody seen any lakes that are at least 50% thawed? Looking to fish a bit this weekend and try out some new gear.