Some things I just never really thought about ..... at least, not until I came here. One was orange lures. I used them in spring for bass and in fall for pike. I always used them close to the bottom, and I never used them in July, August or the first half of September.

   Last night I was fishing in the Sand Pit. It's the only "clear" water around, if you can find clear water in the Midwest this time of year. I've been skunked the last 2 times I fished there, which is unusual. So I ended up throwing everything plus the kitchen sink.

   I threw lots of different spoons, among other things. No go. Then I looked down and saw a black-and-orange 1/3 oz. Eppinger Cop-E-Cat. I thought to myself, "Why not? Nothing else is working." I tried it high. Nothing. I tried it low. Nothing. Half-heartedly, I threw it in mid-water-column.

 

   BINGO! Bass! Not big, but healthy and aggressive.

 

   Obviously, I don't know as much about orange lures as I thought I did. Why mid-column? Why now, at a time I thought orange was a dead deal? Why an orange spoon when I had tried orange Mepps spinners with no luck?

   Any insight is appreciated.

 

 

 

 

   Thanks.      jj

 

The only time I had luck on orange was either topwater in dark/dingy water or when the water was stained brownish orange after a heavy rain/highland runoff. 
 

Other than JJ, I have no explanation. 

Some theories:

1. Visibility: Orange contrasts well against green vegetation and algae stain, which are common in late summer.

2. Forage: Yellow Perch -- open water prey in the northern part of native range, have some orange on them.

3. Random chance: You rolled the dice, they came up sixes. No other reason.

1 minute ago, MIbassyaker said:

Some theories:

1. Visibility: Orange contrasts well against green vegetation and algae stain, which are common in late summer.

2. Forage: Yellow Perch -- open water prey in the northern part of range, have some orange on them.

3. Random chance: You rolled the dice, they came up sixes. No other reason.

I’m going with boxcars…?

12 minutes ago, MIbassyaker said:

Random chance: You rolled the dice, they came up sixes. No other reason.

 

   I'll find out in about 3 hours.   ?        jj

I did well with orange  senkos. I think they were dark on top and fading into a glittery orange on sides and bottom.

I used up the whole pack pretty quick, and havent found any on the shelf since.Ive also caught some on the watermelon orange finesse worm.

Went fishing with a friend last year in a creek off the st Johns. The only fish caught was on an orange bottomed craw imitation bait…

19 minutes ago, N Florida Mike said:

I did well with orange  senkos. I think they were dark on top and fading into a glittery orange on sides and bottom.

I used up the whole pack pretty quick, and havent found any on the shelf since.Ive also caught some on the watermelon orange finesse worm.

Went fishing with a friend last year in a creek off the st Johns. The only fish caught was on an orange bottomed craw imitation bait…

 

   Interesting. What time of year was that?                jj

The only orange I ever had luck with was on jig trailers . I used orange pork frogs in extremely muddy water here and at Table rock after I caught a deep crawdad that had orange tipped pincers .

Never throw the Green Pumpkin Orange TRD for river SMB if you like catching a lot of SMB, and never throw a 956 Senko if you like catching the LMB that others aren't. Definitely stay away from squarebills with orange in them too; nobody needs that much weight in the bag.

51 minutes ago, jimmyjoe said:

 

   Interesting. What time of year was that?                

1 minute ago, N Florida Mike said:

It’s been a few years … but I think it was early fall for the senkos. The finesse worms were fall too I think.

 

Ozark bass dig orange. Also when I fish in Minnesota/Canada for pike, if had a good deal of luck with an orange and black buzz bait. But yeah, mid-column on a spoon is wild. I like the perch theory, if that’s their forage.

 

I think orange spinnerbaits are a thing for muddy water…

They say 1/4 of all men are colorblind. May go for fish too!

I'm on the fence ~

A-Jay

   I think I found the answer.

 

   ???

   ???

   ???

   ☹️☹️☹️

   ???

 

  I skunked out tonight, so @MIbassyaker was right. Oh, well ..........                  jj

Green pumpkin/orange is one of my favorite Ned rig bait colors.

Orange and red bladed jigs are kind of popular in the spring.

I've had good luck with orange when bass are busting shad. It gets noticed when you throw it in the middle of a ball of bait.

On the river I grew up on it was known to a small circle of us that if you wanted to catch quality SMB, you threw cranks with orange in them.

13 hours ago, Jigfishn10 said:

The only time I had luck on orange was either topwater in dark/dingy water or when the water was stained brownish orange after a heavy rain/highland runoff. 
 

Our water is the color of ice tea year round (tannin) that said we have runoff now as well with storms every couple days.

13 hours ago, N Florida Mike said:

I did well with orange  senkos. I think they were dark on top and fading into a glittery orange on sides and bottom.

Went out yesterday afternoon to try to forget the morning we spent 80 miles north catching one 12" SMB. Got to one of our regular spots and son pulled out 2 bags of these orange senkos and threw me a pack. I put one on with mixed feelings but not wanting to offend and the rest of the evening was pretty crazy. Besides some pickerel that were monsters on whopper ploppers (3-4lbs) we caught bass after bass both large and smallmouth including a 3-8 and a 4-10 which are nice fish for up here. Watermelon w/cpr/orang w/red #956. A new favorite to go with a handful of others. 

9 minutes ago, Tatsu Dave said:

Our water is the color of ice tea year round (tannin) that said we have runoff now as well with storms every couple days.

It's crazy the amount of rain we've been getting!?

 

I'll be vacationing next week in Southern Maine and the forecast actually looks decent. 

 

Good luck mi amigo.

Orange bellied crankbaits have accounted for a lot of bass . 

1 hour ago, scaleface said:

Orange bellied crankbaits have accounted for a lot of bass . 

 

8 hours ago, Bluebasser86 said:

Orange and red bladed jigs are kind of popular in the spring.

 

   Spring .... that I knew about. But what surprised me was orange being productive right now (end of July).

   I've always said I like to experiment. It appears that I better experiment a little more!   ?     jj

You got me thinking about my productive river crankbaits. Many have some amount of orange on them. Good post!

One of my best lures was an 8 inch orange spook. Caucht some nice stripers pike and bass 

In all seriousness, random chance is pretty hard to rule out most of the time, for most things that happen!

 

But midcolumn bass forage with shades of orange isn't exotic. I mentioned yellow perch, but there's also several sunfish:

 

Pumpkinseed:

 

orangespotted sunfish:

 

Green Sunfish:

 

Warmouth:

 

....

 

 

 

Just sayin'...

1 hour ago, Mr. Aquarium said:

One of my best lures was an 8 inch orange spook. Caucht some nice stripers pike and bass 

 

   Orange topwater? Now you're really freaking me out! I used to cull topwater or super-shallow lures that had orange anywhere near the belly.

   But that was in the river, too. Now I'm fishing an impoundment. Might make a difference. Might not.        jj