So many variation of those two colors. Anything that I’ve tried (not that many) away from the standard GP w/ black fleck and Watermelon w/ black fleck has worked. 
 

I might want to try the TW version green pumpkin. Because it is more in line with plain pumpkin seed. 
 

I have not problem rigging these slight variations. The all seem to produce. 

I realize this thread is a year old, but reading through it since I had the same question. Im surprised all the responses of watermelon in clear water. In clear water I fish much more natural colors like goby, perch or similar. Anyone else the same?

 

Black is my best clear water color. Black with black fleck is my best stained water color, and for really dirty muddy water color I like a black back with black belly.

Green pumpkin hands down. 

GP is the winner. But if we're talking a Yamamoto senko, light green pumpkin red flake is hands down the best.

I’ve never done all that great with green pumpkin. Now, watermelon with copper flake/orange with red flake? Bingo!

 

 

Watermelon red versus everything

 

Roland Martin is a big proponent of #297 green pumpkin/black flake senkos.  They work well enough for me.

Almost everyone in my club throws green pumpkin soft plastics.  I mop up using smoke/black flake, or watermellon/red flake.  Do they catch 'em using GP? Yea........But not as many.  

I'm gonna rant for a second about green pumpkin. It is bland! Where are the reds, the oranges, the greens, the blues, colors that bass so readily see? Green pumpkin is just a brownish green with boring black flake. It's like off brand cola versus authentic Coca-Cola. People so readily recommend green pumpkin for clear water. I think if I were a bass, I'd rather see green pumpkin in muddy water.... that way I couldn't see it as well.

 

Rant over

I don't know.  I always throw purple worms.

On 2/22/2021 at 9:32 PM, WRB said:

Who can identify or define green pumpkin? Every sift plastic supplier differs. Watermelon however wasn’t as wide spread.

Watermelon red flake was a hot color for Yamamoto and still is. 

We went through the green weenie phase in the 80’s. Light green weenie, green weenie, dark green weenie, green weenie /black and red flake, green weenie/ green flake, green weenie w/ blue flake etc, etc. How does green pumpkin differ from green weenie? Green pumpkin doesn’t have cinnamon  belly, otherwise it’s watermelon.

Green weenie, watermelon and green pumpkin all catch bass if you use it.

Tom

 

I remember the Appleseed lizards which were about the same color as watermelon. 

 

Allen 

On 4/1/2022 at 12:22 PM, WRangler506 said:

I realize this thread is a year old, but reading through it since I had the same question. Im surprised all the responses of watermelon in clear water. In clear water I fish much more natural colors like goby, perch or similar. Anyone else the same?

 

Choppy water or overcast skies water red rules the day. Calm water smoke purple or smoke red work best for me. Only thing I can figure is bluegill look different with sun shining vs overcast. Reason I think choppy water leans towards water red is the chop likely alters how the light hits the fish. That is my theory on when and why those colors work in clear water. Probably wrong but it never fails for me. 
 

And to the question, green pumpkin is a big zero for me. Green pumpkin purple gold is a good river color so I am not totally against GP. 

Green pumpkin/ red flake works everywhere, year around.

I'd be shocked if 2 out of 100 bass can tell the difference between GP and watermelon.   Whether or not flakes make a difference, I'm a bit more on the fence.....I do tend to think that dark (black or red) flakes can make a slight difference. 

Not be fan greens either green pumpkin or water melon,  prefer purples, ox blood and shad colors with neon highlites. The few I use are Senko’s #301 & 330 and Flick Shacky 4.8 Water Melon Candy because they sometimes work where I fish during day light.

Tom

 

I'm partiallycolorblind and both styles of color look exactly the same, shade for shade, and I'd say bass don't notice a huge difference either. 

On 2/22/2021 at 5:49 PM, Mr. Aquarium said:

Which one do you prefer? Notice a difference between them? 

I pretty much have equal luck with them both as they both are great producers! Literally get a pack of both and see if you catch more on one than the other. I doubt you will have a big difference. 
 

 

7 minutes ago, NavyVet1204 said:

I pretty much have equal luck with them both as they both are great producers! Literally get a pack of both and see if you catch more on one than the other. I doubt you will have a big difference. 
 

 

Hahah yep, that’s what I do as well

When I fished at night, Watermelon senkos would constantly produce and green pumpkin never did. 
 

I let different friends that never fished before use the watermelon and I would use the green pumpkin.  They would catch and I wouldn’t.  Different nights and different spots.

 

Only other color that was as effective at the watermelon at night was junebug.

On 2/22/2021 at 6:19 PM, Team9nine said:

Green pumpkin - hands down. Won't even buy watermelon anymore...but most all of my waters are stained to some degree, and it just seems like GP does better. I've got a couple watermelon colored baits, and I'll toss them from time to time, but I really think they do better in more transparent (clear) environments. Might just be in my head - who knows. Whatever gives you confidence...and that isn't watermelon for me 

 

A couple months ago, I would have completely agreed with you.  But a watermellon/red plastic has easily been my most productive bait this spring even in some stained water situations.  Just ordered 6 more bags of them from TW.  

Seems like a lot of folks like the watermelon better than green pumpkin in clear water and that's not been my experience.   I have caught hundreds upon hundreds of bass (including lots of 4-5 pounders) in very, very clear water (Finger Lakes, Thousand Islands, etc. etc.) on green pumpkin and it seems that every time I switch to watermelon or any other variation of a darker greenish color that my catch rate drops.  Who knows, may be a confidence factor or just a perception rather than reality.   

 

I did recently start fishing a new lake(s) a lot and of course the locals here have their own favorite colors that typically don't match the colors that I'm used to from up north, so I tend to concentrate a lot less on color these days than I used to, but almost all of my soft plastics (and even most of my hard baits) are in combinations of a couple of looks, either green pumpin'ish colors, shad colors, etc..

Gary Yamamoto has an article floating around somewhere about his favorite colors. Said he started fishing the GP/watermelon laminate so he could stop worrying about which one to use. I think laminates look more like natural things anyway. And there's also a red flake version of the same. 

On 2/23/2021 at 8:58 AM, moguy1973 said:

When I started fishing for bass heavily I heard the color "watermelon" and I would always think it was a red color with black flake, you know, because when you think of watermelon you think of the edible part of the melon, not the rind.  Then when I went to buy a bag of worms or craws in that color I didn't see it in the bags of red baits.  When I realized it was green and not red it didn't make much sense to me.  That said, I've never had much luck with watermelon colored baits, and I've had a ton of luck with green pumpkin with whatever color flake in them.

 

Exactly!  I trolled for great lakes trout and walleye before getting into bass fishing. And a "watermelon" trolling spoon looked like a watermellon... Green, pink, with black dots.