So This time of the year I always think about streamer fishing since I used to take trips to the green river in Utah in winter all the time to float with my brother and friends. Actually after fishing the green most of my life through all seasons and guiding on it, winter became one of my favorite times of the year to fish there. You could float and see very few people if any and if u floated the lower river you usually saw nobody plus the streamer fishing was usually pretty good in fact sometimes it was absolutely on fire which seems weird in mid winter but I think it was because brown trout had finished spawning and were hungry, brown trout are always aggressive and there were various smaller fish hatched in recent times including the rainbows from the spring and later in winter the brown trout from the fall.
Anyway, the interesting thing that I found that I could never figure out was why was the fact that the fish would take very unusual colors in the winter. I first was made aware of this by one of the old masters of the green, Emmit Heath (one of the first guides on the river) who I guided under for many years. He used to fish a pink wooly bugger with white hackle called the playboy bunny. I fished the playboy bunny frequently and there were days when it outfished everything else by far. I have since fished that fly all over the country and been succesful. I never could figure out why they took it though and prob never will. Maybe it looked like flesh or somethig like that but there were no dead spawned out salmon or anything in the river plus they would aggressively chase the fly and I don't think flesh can swim very fast . Over he years I began trying all sorts o different colors that all produced at times including blue, red and yellow but nothing ever was as red hot as the pink and certain shades of pink were especially deadly. Anyway just thinking about that since it is that time of year where I spent a lot of time fishing this way. Curious to hear if anybody else is successful with odd colored streamers?
I like to believe that I can think outside the box; but on this one I could be all wet. We flyfishermen (and women) think that when we are streamer fishing we are imitating fish. In addition, we think that fish are motivated only by hunger. While I cannot dispute these concepts (and I tend to believe them as well, for the most part), fish may not be as easily understood as we would like.
Example: I have had numerous brookies attack my fluorescent floating indicators when nymphing. I can't imagine what food they believe comes in fluorescent green/orange. And they attacked the indicator despite my yummy nymph that was passing by down at their level in the water column. My humble conclusion is that fish also strike out of aggression! They see something unusual coming through their territory and attack it either through curiosity or a desire to get that thing outta here! Aren't thier mouths their best weapons?
An additional thought... don't winter steelhead fishermen commonly attempt to immitate spawned salmonid eggs? Aren't these eggs commonly pink, amber, cheese colored and other pretty non-insect- and non-fish-like colors? So is the playboy bunny's color such that it may fool fish into thinking "egg" when the fisherman (or woman) is thinking swimming baitfish. Is discrimination less likely during the scarcity of food in winter?
Our empirical experience leads us to believe in what works; but, our interpretation of WHY it works may bear absolutely no relationship to why the fish does what it does! Maybe fish aren't all that smart! Or at least there is no requirement that they think the same way that we think! I also believe that they don't have to be very smart to outsmart me!
In regard to the aggression, i definitely agree that fish do strike out of aggression especially during certain situations. When they are spawning or staging for spawning they are much more aggressive and are protecting their spawning areas. It is interesting though with Brown Trout being some of the more aggressive predators in the trout world that they tend to be most aggressive prior to the spawn in my experience than actually during the spawn. I guess this makes sense logically since they are getting ready to reproduce and are protecting territory, then once they are actually in the act they need to remain focused or they won't be successful. Of course I have still had them strike while they were spawning but a few weeks prior seems to be when they are at the peak of their aggression.
As far as striking the pink bugger because it is similar in color to an egg, this probably has something to do with it but it doesn't account for the times when the fish chase the fly extremely aggressively at a high rate of speed when it is nowhere near the bottom. I guess it could just be a trigger and when you combine it with the aggression there is a one two punch effect of sorts. You have them chasing it out of aggression and striking it out of recognition of the color being a food source. Makes a lot of sense. Although, consider one other example that I briefly mentioned, the color blue or color purple. These are both very effective colors that really don't occur in a natural aquatic environment (at least not the hues that I have been successful with). I have had very successful days with bright blue patterns during very random times of the year. I have kind of concluded that rainbow trout look blue though and maybe this is why. Maybe that is why they take purple as well. For bright red, maybe it is the egg as well. Also I don't really know the color spectrum that trout see, I haven't really researched that. Truly not sure whether we will ever no for sure, but I enjoy theorizing about it and I feel that every small piece of information that you can add to your aresenal makes you a better fisherman.
I have always loved to experiment with my fishing and still continue to do so. When something is working and the fishing is very good I have frequently been known to switch to a different fly after catching repeated fish on one to see how it varies. I also change presentation techniques etc. to see what effect each variable has. When I streamer fish I constantly change colors, patterns, stripping speeds, how much i let it sink etc and thoroughly enjoy trying out the different things. This is one of the things that I have always loved about fly fishing; there are so many different things to play around with and try and you can never be perfect or master every one. I never get tired of it thats for sure.
I did want to say one more thing. You mentioned briefly that fish strike also out of curiosity and I agree 100%. This could be a much bigger factor than anything else. Fish don't have hands or any other way of learning about their environment than to put things in their mouth. It is very likely that they strike because they are curious and the best way to find out about it is to put it in their mouth. There was a study done (not scientific, just personal observation) by a guy on the North Umpqua river in Oregon on steelhead. He was the "fish watcher" and I think he still is over a pool on a tributary to the river called steamboat creek. His name is Lee Spencer and he would sit and watch over this pool for several months every summer. For some reason the fish would gather in this small pool despite the fact that there were plenty of pools for them to hold in along the 12 miles of stream that were below this point. They chose this one every year though for whatever reason (i think that they determined it was largely the perfect temperature). Anyway, he spent months observing these fish and taking notes about every single thing the fish did. The pool was only about 20-30 feet long by about 15 feet wide and about 6 feet deep and would hold up to 500 plus steelhead (they were stacked like cordwood). You could not fish the creek or this pool since they were completely closed to fishing so it was strictly a place to observe the fish. Over the course of several years Lee took notes of the fish behavior including, among many other things, every time they put something in their mouth. He compiled the results and found that the object that they put in their mouths more than anything else was alder twigs (frequently with lichen on them). They put this in their mouth more than insects, baitfish and other food sources. In fact he said that the majority of the time they spit out everything they put in their mouths including food (these were steelhead that came into the river mid summer and lived off of fat reserves all through the late summer and winter until they spawned in the spring). At any rate, he concluded that the reason they put the alder twig in their mouths more than anything else was because it always looked different. He said that when an insect hatch would occur, the fish would take the bugs for the first day or two and then quit taking them altogether as they got used to it (and mostly spitting out the insects as well). They would continuously take the alder twigs though since they would vary in size, shape and color. I think this comes into play for many fish in many situations and could explain taking strike indicators (which happens frequently in my experience yellow, orange, white, big, small, partially floating, fully floating etc.) It also could explain the different streamer colors. I guess we really will never know but for me it is very fascinating and again something to keep in mind when fishing that can give you a little more insight.
I like this curiosity idea! But if we take it a few steps further, then do we conclude that curiosity may be a better way to catch fish than imitating food? Are fish perhaps really intelligent but with a fatal tendency towards curiousity?
Are the fish thinking, "What is this stupid metal thing with feathers and fur on it?"
Perhaps those times when I thought that I had outsmarted the fish, I had really only attracted a "mouthing" by a fish that thought my imitation was just so poor/hilarious that he/she couldn't believe it.
Alder twigs? I really like that... When I was making my first futile attempts at nymphing, I used short twigs (about 3 inches long, split lengthwise about half way) as indicators. I would run my leader in the split and close it with a rubber band (the kind orthodontists used on braces). The twig would float just like our present-day indicators! I thought that these would be great because they were very natural-looking to me and wouldn't alarm the fish.
We may have a whole new approach to attracting fish. In many respects it is really amazing just how much we can conclude (possibly erroneously) when we approach our fishing queries unscientifically! Don't get me wrong. I I find it difficult to approach fishing as a science with limited time and the knowledge that each cast may affect the results of every subsequent cast and the knowledge that no two casts are identical. I don't have time to approach it scientifically, nor do I wish to bring my work along with me when I fish. Still, the whole motivation issue is fun to consider!
Wow a lot of great things on this post! Getting back to the original post, I use a lot of PEACH colored rabbit strips in the spring and late fall. It looks great in the water and has been very effective for me in colder water temps. Why, I have no clue?
last April I caught the biggest fish of a miserable 6 fish day on the Bitterroot with a peach rabbit strip and black bodied streamer. My buddy told me I was crazy using it, but after landing three fish on it he changed his mind!
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. Over he years I began trying all sorts o different colors that all produced at times including blue, red and yellow but nothing ever was as red hot as the pink and certain shades of pink were especially deadly. Anyway just thinking about that since it is that time of year where I spent a lot of time fishing this way. Curious to hear if anybody else is successful with odd colored streamers?
