North Australian FISH FINDER forums

Never worried too much about colours, though in some cases it certainly does make a difference. Always put that one behind strength, size, vibration, sound, depth, presentation and retrieve.

I'll always favour a mosaic pattern of reflective and non reflective surfaces, exactly what you get when a lure has half its paint missing. Looking a bit like a half munted and boofed mullet with half its scales gone. Not that it makes much of a difference where the water looks like a ploughed field. But when it does the older the lure and the rougher the paint job is the better it works I reckon.

Can see a market for designer munted lures in much the same way that new pairs of old jeans are all the rage.

Gotta make you wonder why soft plastics with with hardly any action work so well,

But plastics do produce vibrations which is a barra's prime sensor. The vibrations come from tail (or hanging floppy bits) and from the ripple surface of the lure. If smooth surface they'll have enhanced tail action eg Hollowbellies, Wedgetails, Thumper tails etc. Look at plastic lure action in Matts article. Shows how vibrations are achieved from plastics.

Colour only comes into play when other sensors (mainly lateral line working off vibrations) bring barra into visual range Sometimes that visual range is very very short (eg dirty water) with both the barra and the lure "on the move". I believe that's what accounts for the numbers of "missed strikes" which fail to hook up properly. Allow a lure to stand still (like a suspending lure) so an interested barra can line it up properly, there'll be far fewer missed strikes.

On an outing here, I brought a lure back to a snag where I knew a barra was sitting. Stopped the lure movement beside the snag and let it suspend. Took 17 seconds before the barra scoffed it. Water was pretty clear (Shoalwater Bay) so I had seen the barra and he could see the lure. Took 17 seconds for him to inch his way to it.

Just on that subject, I also believe that's why slow steady retrieves are usually more successful. Easier for barra to line up his apparent meal.

The important point is to attract the barra's attention in the first place. That's the role of the vibrations from the lure as it moves through the water.

vibration is my main goto before colour in out tannum coloured waters,that slow swagger in a lure is my fave with a slow slow rise in them .as ron said a lot of strikes come from the pause but i think the attention seeking part of the lure is key.colours in barra lures confuse the shite out of me in big sessions where there could be two or three diff ones working at the same time.thats where vibration confirms it for me .

I believe you're spot on about the action first, Al.

Instead of picking a particular colour, Al maybe grouping the colours around the "X" in those colour charts might be the key. More general in nature rather than specific. That's the way I do it now.

I found that a certain colour Jackall Squirrel worked best in the clear clean water of Shoalwater Bay but not as well in the dirtier Fitzroy. Wasn't as clued up on colour penetration at that stage so couldn't work out why. Been following that "X" a bit now and getting better results. Putting more thought into what the water type is.

Don't use scents, Flicker. Mainly because I don't know anything about barra smelling ability.

Some people swear by them so maybe there's something in it.

To be honest I was struggling with lure action, vibrations and colour enough as it was. Maybe I'll see what the smell bit does after I get my head bedded down about the stuff I looked at.

Terraeyes. The eyes doubled up as weights.

Used them very successfully on the Roper. Got some bigger versions overseas 'cos I didn't trust the small hooks. They never let me down but I just didn't feel confident about them.

Can you still get them? Want some of the bigger ones?

I don't need any, Flicker.

I've got some bigger TerroEyes that I thought you might like. If that's what they are.

You can have what I've got if you want 'em.

Be interesting to find out about barra smell. Might put a myth or 2 to bed or confirm 1 or 2.

It would be interesting to know if Barra smell.

It would also be fun to learn their language....

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-12-30/ ... h/10669816

This has been a great read I only just picked it up.
I'm on the same page as far as the lateral line first goes, based on recent experiences. I basically only fish soft plastics these days unless trolling and even then I have started using plastics for that too.
One thing I will add that seems relevant here is that I have had the same methods that work very well for me in dirty or slightly dirty green water that do not work when the water is clean. And I am talking about the exact same spot on a lock in here when you know 100% the fish are there. This has happened many times. Now I have spots I will go to on different tides and phases of the tide (build or fall into/out of springs) based on how I know the water will be once the run has ceased.
I guess the point I am trying to make is that my methods work very well when the environment suits them, with the barra having a lateral line response followed by limited visual with good hook up rates on most strikes (although this has taken awhile to get right). However add too much visibility and they don't want a bar of the same plastics, regardless of colour changes and actions for retrieval etc.

And I have started using s-factor on nearly everything nowadays especially after handling the lure / plastic.
I think it makes a difference to the second chance strikes, like when you cop a head but or miss a fish and it hasnt really felt the hook. I have found since using s-factor that I have sometimes caught the fish on the 3rd pass of the snag with a bump each time where without it they might have dismissed it. This is just a casual observation without evidence, but like previously mentioned, fishing reacts to confidence and positivity, if you "feel" like you're going to be on then most times it happens, s-factor has become part of that process for me.

Skotty, my advice is that whatever colours you use make sure they're fluro (not glow-in-the-dark).

Fluro ensures that whatever lures you use are given the best chance of a barra seeing them. I recommend that you try following the X on the 3 little colour charts which sum up colours in dirty, medium and clear water. Be interested in hearing results if you try it.

Hard to get fluro soft plastics (I think) but one lure that I had lots of success on in greenish water for 5-6 years here (mainly lagoons or cleaner running stuff) was the Kokoda Barra Assassin. Always believed that it was the action until about 3 months ago when I accidently waved a u/v torch past some soft plastics on a shelf.

One lit up green in the packet ( the Kokoda Assassin) and that's how I learned that the action wasn't the only thing that contributed to the success of that type of soft plastic. The manufacturer had used fluro colouring in the mix. I hadn't known that (no mention of fluro on the packet).

I'd used other green soft plastics with fair success at those places but none matched the Kokoda's success. I'd always thought it was the action but now have to acknowledge that the fluro probably played a large part as well.

I've got about 20 packets of these left and will now fish them knowing that the action is good AND that the fluro colour enhances its visibility to barramundi in those types of waters.

Can't get those lures now.

One outcome from my little project is that I now go lure-looking in tackle shops with a u/v torch in hand.

Fellas

I'm looking for a couple of images that make up the water colours that you fish in at different times of the year.

Preferably underwater images for those of you with go-pro stills or video over the side of the boat.

Clearer water in run-off? Dirtier water where runoff meets river? Dams? Inshore reefs or headlands?

I'm doing up an article based on contrast following up on the "what colours can be best seen" articles. Basically how to use "most visible colours to give contrast between lure and differing background water colour".

For example, a colour may be indistinguishable from the background water colour at times.

I'm ok with local waters but need some images of barramundi water from other parts of Aus. Not looking for extremes of murkiness or colour (got plenty of murky stuff locally).

I could dig out a few from around the Harbour here for you but none from under the water Ron.

I look forward to reading your research and whether there's a difference between full sun and full overcast conditions - maybe a combined third and conclusive article

Thanks for those images.

Can I use them, please?

Not a problem Ron.

The bottom two pics are from West Arm.

Mate, don't apologise. I'm grateful for whatever I can get. Thank you.

If you're going to use a lure prodder to get the gopro down to a bit of depth, can I suggest that you put some depth markings on it to show the image at different depths? THAT would be great!

Here, the water is mostly murky all the time (unless you go above the barrage into the fresh after its had 6 months to settle following a run in the river). Then its "murky green".

A few years ago at Port Alma, I can recall thinking how clean the water was when I could actually see down far enough to watch the prop turning while idling around at the ramp.

Here's that photo of the Kokoda Barra Assassin soft plastic that I was talking about. Geez, I've caught some barra with that particular lure here.

Another factor in fish chewing or not is what mood they are in and what preditors are around. Later in the year on a river such as the daly the bullsharks are fierce and plentiful. In my oppinion during this stage of the river using a lure that has a massive amount of vibration is a waste of time. Any thing that puts out a large amount of vibration is usually big and is potentialy a preditor such as a shark. I believe that this is part of the reason that barra will hit prawn imitations a lot better as they have a lack of vibration. The Doa is another lure with minimal vibration and seems to work.

I also have a tendancy to try and hide the lure more than make it obvious to fish. Matching the water colour to the lure colour.

On a trip to a big river mouth recently we caught fish on 5 different coloured lures. Usually we ran 4 different rods all with the same brand and depth lures to keep the test to some scientific standard. The funny part was the colour that got hit changed as the conditions did and on many occasions only one of the rods would go off for 4 or five fish in a row. In low light morning conditions the kryptonite colour got eatin most, as the tide got higher and was running harder with some milky coloured mud boil the white lures came into play, as the water cleared at the top of the tide in bright sun the light brown and clear body flurescent colours turned on. As the water turned to pump out and the water colour closed over with mud boils the bright fluro green and black custom colour from craigs yielded results. So my conclusion was that some times we were trying to make the lure stand out, but other times we were trying to hide it. Some times you just wanted to give your self an upper cut for even thinking it was possible to understand what was happening but there was a definate pattern happening. Eventuall we ran 2 of the same colour and 2 of another colour and still only one colour would get hit. So yes i believe colour plays a part, but it is 5th thing inline for me behind depth, size, action, speed, colour, and probably the biggest thing fish density. If you are not where the fish are in numbers your chances are next to zero!