Lure Color

Bait debate: What color lures the rockfish?

By BILL BURTON
Published April 17, 2008

If you want to initiate a debate, amble down to the docks of a Chesapeake Bay fishing center and - with an air of innocence - ask "What's the best color for rockfish this year?"

It's like Capt. Ed Darwin once said: Ask 10 charter boat captains a question and you'll get 12 different answers - one of them will change his mind. Twice.
That's the way things are shaping up for Saturday's opener of Maryland's spring rockfish trophy season. Will stripers favor white, chartreuse, yellow or green this season? Thus far in pre-season, catch-and-release angling reports that have crossed this desk of 57 trips that have turned up catches it has been 27 for predominately white, 15 for chartreuse, six yellow, and four green - and five for silver (as in spoons).

My notes also indicate that 36 of those fish were taken on umbrella rigs, 15 on tandem rigs and six on single line rigs, which isn't surprising. I regret I didn't differentiate between large and small umbrellas, but as I figure from memory it was about two-to-one in favor of the large ones.

It's color that's the big question. From year to year, it seems rockfish change preferences - or is it just the preference of fishermen? It might be just this: If the first bait a fishermen toss over the stern catches a fish on a white bait, he'll stay with white, that's the color. So the most catches stay on white because there are more fishermen using white. That's way it has been going with my personal fishing experience the past 10 years or so and my preference has been mostly white, which I think is coming back in popularity.

About 18 years ago when chartreuse came on with a big bang, most everyone switched to it and it was top dog for a decade - then white became increasingly popular for bucktails and today I figure it's pretty close to 50/50. Methinks you can't go wrong with either. Keep in mind that "yellow" or "green" are basically varying shades of chartreuse - it's in the eye of the skipper.

It appears also that things are about even in the, shall we say, the depth department. Half the early fishermen I've checked with have caught their fish with their baits 15 or more feet down (they think), the other half in the top 15 feet. Tom Kane can't tell you how deep his bait was when he scored on an umbrella rig, near Thomas Point the other day, but he knows he fished 10 ounces of lead weight and paid out 110 feet of line and the water temperature was 46.5 degrees. His color was chartreuse and it was the only catch of the day as he fished the Hot Pursuit with Mike O'Brien.

I'm like many anglers; I haven't fully decided what I'll fish Saturday out of Deale, but leading my list is a lone ranger of silver (No. 19 Tony Accetta) fished far back from the boat with only two ounces of lead weight to keep in close to the top, probably eight feet down. That will be on the top line of a tandem rig, On the bottom line will probably be one of Bernie Michael's big bullet head bucktails of white with a chartreuse Twister Tail or perhaps a big strip of white/yellow pork rind.

If it's your first trip of the year in your own boat and you can dictate the choice, I'd fish at least one bait 20 feet down and mix the other baits from 12 feet down to several feet from the surface - especially if it's a bright and warm day.

I've noted that since that new Virginia record rockfish of 73 pounds was caught on a Mann's Stretch 30+ bait a few months back, more fishermen are going with swimming plugs, which is what Tommy Johnson of Crofton was using when he caught and released a 44-incher off Thomas Point.

Best fish I've heard of via catch-and-release thus far is a 47-incher taken at Bloody Point by Ray Hubbard of Bowie. And on a white parachute. If you're still undecided, you can't go wrong with Bloody Point. Good fishing.