Does Plug Type & Color Really Matter ?

[Slammer223]

Very interesting.

[Sweetwater]

Plug type and color do matter. And I think significantly so.

Start with color: I don't think the specific color matters but certainly dark vs. light plugs make a huge difference. The old adage "dark at night and light at day" holds. At night, I've not found much difference between black and purple at night, and during the day "sand eel" colors, pink, yellow, and white will all produce.

When jigging, I've found that white, chartruese, and pink parachutes will do better when squid are around, but if you're fishing the Race or other areas with lobster about, dark purple, black, and deep red are the colors to use.

But maybe more than color, size and shape need to be considered. I've seen situations where guys are landing fish on 1 or 2 oz crippled herring but a 3 oz won't get a tap, especially when peanut bunker are around.

Likewise if the surf is heavy, a needle fish might be effective cutting through the chop when a polaris, pencil popper, or a danny just get's tossed around and are useless. But if the water is calm mambos and rebels might outproduce anthing (or possibly poppers).

[capesams]

Originally Posted by Sweetwater

Plug type and color do matter. And I think significantly so.

Start with color: I don't think the specific color matters but certainly dark vs. light plugs make a huge difference. The old adage "dark at night and light at day" holds. At night, I've not found much difference between black and purple at night, and during the day "sand eel" colors, pink, yellow, and white will all produce.

When jigging, I've found that white, chartruese, and pink parachutes will do better when squid are around, but if you're fishing the Race or other areas with lobster about, dark purple, black, and deep red are the colors to use.

But maybe more than color, size and shape need to be considered. I've seen situations where guys are landing fish on 1 or 2 oz crippled herring but a 3 oz won't get a tap, especially when peanut bunker are around.

Likewise if the surf is heavy, a needle fish might be effective cutting through the chop when a polaris, pencil popper, or a danny just get's tossed around and are useless. But if the water is calm mambos and rebels might outproduce anthing (or possibly poppers).

I totally agree..when pulling wire..I can take the same weight jig in 4 different sold colors and catch most fish on one color where the other color's don't even get looked at.

[Skitterpop]

on a dark night...on top or not too far down into the column

White plugs often catch?



This year I`m going to rig some white S...-..s and see what happens
but you can bet I`ll have black with me also

[Skitterpop]

moved

[Karl F]

Agawam beach, looking left...

[cheferson]

Originally Posted by capesams

I totally agree..when pulling wire..I can take the same weight jig in 4 different sold colors and catch most fish on one color where the other color's don't even get looked at.

Dont certain colors have better visibility depending on the depth of water because some light wavelengths only get down to a certain depth??

[shadow]

Action and profile is most importent.However us fisherman can be very misleading on this subjuct because we all say color isn't importent then later say "oh yellow w/ a red head is a great color w/ that plug" or" black,gold,silver dannys are great"I know most of the time all it takes is a white or dark plug worked properly to catch.However whether it is because someone I respect once said something about some color or I'v done well w/ some color plug there is something that makes me use other colors then just white& black all the time.