Fish Becoming Conditioned

[PABASS]

In the animal world you need to adapt, Bass are no different.  Bass can be conditioned for sure, fish a local pond and over time the fish wise up I have seen it several times with several ponds, but winter does seem to reset some things however very shortly after they are back to being harder to catch..

[Paul Roberts]

Agreed. It's not a complete reset. Fish a pond that's NEVER been fished and you'll see.

[PABASS]

I know trout are not bass but they are fish and have some similar qualities, anyway I am lucky enough to have wild trout in rivers I fish, they will not hit typical baits and lures used to catch the farm raised trout, for example powerbait,mealworms and even inline spinners they are hard to catch on spinning gear and you really must match the hatch and employ fly gear to fool these fish, point is they have been conditioned, just as there farm raised relatives have been to eat certain foods and I know Bass are no different.  Just keep in mind we humans condition many animals to eat things they never would in nature, fish, bass are no different.

[Snakehead Whisperer]

Well then...If I found a pin in my Whopper...I probably wouldn't order another one for a while but I'm pretty sure that I'd give them another try. But am I smarter than a Bass?

Or a finger in your chili?

[NEjitterbugger]

Lol awesome. Throw a French fry with a hook in it and see if they stop eating French fries!

 

 

lol now that would be interesting.

 

 

That's what  will try when the stripers begin running into the rivers... LOL

[WRB]

The view point to look at unconditioned bass verses conditioned bass makes the point.

There are a lot of conditioned bass, every public lake sees a lot of fishing pressure. Not so many opportunities to fish for unconditioned bass that have never been caught before, unless you know someone with a private lake that doesn't get fishing pressure or a new lake stocked with bass and not fished for a decade.

I have had several opportunities to fish virgin bass lakes and they bass populations are very aggressive and stupid easy to catch. DVL or Diamond Valley Lake in California was well stocked with several year classes of FLMB and the lake opening was postponed for 7 years . When DVL opened the bass fishing was beyond belief, 35 lb, 5 bass limits was the norm for about 6 mounts. C & R was encouraged and bass anglers released the bass they caught. After 6 months the bass became a lot harder to catch, now after 8 years the lake is like any other bass lake, good days and tough days with occasion big bass catches. The unconditioned bass became conditioned to lures.

Tom

[xbacksideslider]

Maybe they have a different sort of mind, binary, or go-no go, such that the big ones get that way simply by being wary, by having an easy "no go" impulse and a tough to trigger "go" impulse. 

 

Not thought just stimulus and response.

 

Getting caught is traumatic, imprints deeply, increases frequency of future "no go" responses.

 

On the other hand, predators have to be smarter than prey.

[Paul Roberts]

For the sake of argument, anyone been on a hot crappie bite using live bait only to have it slow down and then pick up again. The fish are still there, they;ve just changed their feeding habit. What of the possibility of disturbing the school is causing the slowed bite? Same with a school of bass. You pull a couple out of the school and the others become weary. Or catch and release a few and they go back and tell their buddies.....

 

I just saw this.

 

That’s a good point. Exactly what's turning fish on and off can be hard to get at and we're left to interpret as best we can. Here are some thoughts, and things I've seen...

 

As to schools of fish turning on and off I've interpreted it (in part from watching fish in clear shallow waters) as fish bouncing between being put off (being disturbed) and excited by competition -the latter being a strong motivator. Bob Underwood wrote about diving with bass and one thing he was excited about was how his test angler could be casting repeatedly to a school of bass with no response. The only reason that angler didn’t move on is bc Bob told him the bass were there. Suddenly, Bob said, a bass would yawn –stretch its jaw muscles. Then another would yawn, then another. Suddenly one would grab the lure that had been so disinteresting previously. Then the whole school turned on and the angler caught one after another. Brian Waldman (bigindianabass) has described fishing to large post-spawn/pre-summer aggregations in which he could catch 30, 40, or more on “a run”. I think his record was something like 60 fish! Get one to bite and…it’s off the races. Positioning on the school is critical he says, but I also wonder whether those fish are not just waking up. I wouldn’t know, my home waters now are too small for such massive aggregations. I tend to trust Brian's interpretations.

 

When I'm fishing groups of fish I often try to think ahead before I start bombing the group. Trying to catch fish off the top of the school, then going deeper alongside, then going back to the top is one way that can sometimes seem to eek more bites. But I’m not down there, so I dunno.

 

One group situation I seek out is when bass in my ponds target spawning bluegills. Groups of mature bass hang out around the ‘gill colonies waiting for opportunities to efficiently capture a ‘gill. The bass can be spooked, or put off, if I just excitedly start chucking and I might only catch one or two. So I fish carefully and place casts outside and along the edges of the colony, and use any cover to both hide negative parts of my presentations and serve as “ambush points” –which I define as places that offer energetically efficient opportunities for fish to make a kill. I cast so my lures enter quietly, and I switch lures (usually between 2 or 3 options). The idea is catch as many of the bass as I can before I need to rest them, moving on to pester another colony.

 

As to my switching lures to eek out more bites idea, I’ve come to that from enough experiences in which the events happened in such a short span of time that I don’t believe it’s the fish “turning on or off” on their own accord. And I’ve just plain watched it -fish getting wise to one lure then willing to try another: Catching spawning ‘gills with fly tackle, nymphing to clusters of trout in a stream pool, steelhead gone stale from too many fluorescent balls drifting by, suddenly committing suicide bc I switched to an in-line spinner –something they’d never seen before. Catching stream smallies in pools: I used to live near a good smally stream and I’d spend hot summer days fishing and swimming. I’d approach a good swimming hole, cast a jig and catch several before they wised up. Then I’d switch to an in-line and catch some more. Then I’d jump in and cool off. Repeat at next pool, picking raspberries along the way. Gosh, I miss that stream.

 

Another case of fish “wising up”, or more accurately, educated bass being “wise” to begin with... A while back I fished a small res for the first time. Got out of the car to do some reconnaissance, and walked up on a 4lb largemouth. Then another. Then two more! They were large females on small groups of large spawning ‘gills. I’d hit it just right in timing. I went back to the car to get my gear, shaking with anticipation. As I was rigging a couple other anglers came over and said, morosely, “Did you see those big bass? …They won’t hit anything.”

 

I approached the bass quietly, but somewhat visibly, and tried several things including a swimming worm, a 4” wacky’d finesse worm, and a plastic craw, to no avail. But I’d noticed something in those fish at my approach, something I’ve seen fish do before. Their erect fins sagged and they sunk ever so slightly deeper at my approach. They “sulked” is how I describe it. Trout on hard-fished rivers, esp large browns, do this. So, I rested the bass, then rotated back through each fish approaching low to the water’s edge and hidden behind shoreline brush. Casting from behind bushes was difficult but the bass did not see me, and did not sulk. And I caught three of the four. Two tipped up for the swimming worm on the first cast like a trout coming up for a dry fly. Number three took the worm on the second cast. She was interested but turned away on the first, and took the worm killed and twitched on the second. The fourth had moved and spotted me on my attempted approach, and vacated. The bass I lipped were two 19s” and a 20” –top fish for that water –or just about anywhere here in Colorado.

 

[slonezp]

Riddle me this. Why do bass continue to strike, or ignore lures while in the confines of the Hawgtrough? Please don't tell me it's because of the new magic lure or scent. I realize this is far from natural surroundings, but it's naturat to the fish. They are used to seeing people crowd around them and know they are not a threat unlike Pauls story about having to hide in order to catch fish. Yet time and time again I've seen the bass hit the bait(s) or ignore them. I cannot think it is anymore than the bass either being hungry and not hungry, or bored and stimulated. Nothing more, nothing less. I can't seem to fathom how "conditioning" can overpower instinct

[Crestliner2008]

Great discussion! Until we can actually get inside the brain of a fish, we will NEVER know the answer. However, some rules never change. A bass is a predatory animal, that HAS TO take advantage of an opportunity to feed - it has no choice. This is especially true of the ice out through spring and the fall through ice up periods. This is why folks still catch bass on Hula Poppers and River Runts to this day. And on plain ole' red & white patterns.

 

I believe fish can be conditioned, but only for a short period of time. With any kind of lull in presenting a particular lure or bait, the bass will resort back to it's primordial instincts and proceed to feed opportunistically. Just the way I look at it. And I do NOT look at it very much. I'm more of the school of thought that any fish can be caught - regardless of the pressure it has to endure - by adhering to the basic premise of depth and speed control.

[slonezp]

Great discussion! Until we can actually get inside the brain of a fish, we will NEVER know the answer. However, some rules never change. A bass is a predatory animal, that HAS TO take advantage of an opportunity to feed - it has no choice. This is especially true of the ice out through spring and the fall through ice up periods. This is why folks still catch bass on Hula Poppers and River Runts to this day. And on plain ole' red & white patterns.

 

I believe fish can be conditioned, but only for a short period of time. With any kind of lull in presenting a particular lure or bait, the bass will resort back to it's primordial instincts and proceed to feed opportunistically. Just the way I look at it. And I do NOT look at it very much. I'm more of the school of thought that any fish can be caught - regardless of the pressure it has to endure - by adhering to the basic premise of depth and speed control.

Anyone worth his weight who trolls for walleye or salmonoids  knows the importance of this and would probably tell you this is more important than bait choice.

[Paul Roberts]

Riddle me this. Why do bass continue to strike, or ignore lures while in the confines of the Hawgtrough? Please don't tell me it's because of the new magic lure or scent. I realize this is far from natural surroundings, but it's naturat to the fish. They are used to seeing people crowd around them and know they are not a threat unlike Pauls story about having to hide in order to catch fish. Yet time and time again I've seen the bass hit the bait(s) or ignore them. I cannot think it is anymore than the bass either being hungry and not hungry, or bored and stimulated. Nothing more, nothing less. I can't seem to fathom how "conditioning" can overpower instinct

Well… again I don’t know where exactly where conditioning leaves off and learning begins. But, in my mind, if learning didn’t occur then there wouldn‘t be fish. Fish experience pain and fear for a reason –it’s a very old survival mechanism.

 

Are you suggesting that when fish are hungry they cannot be spooked, alarmed, put off? Approach is one of the primary tactics anglers have to learn. I won’t bother giving examples beyond saying that you should try stream fishing for wild trout. I’ve spent considerable time watching stream trout and anglers interact. The clumsy, or clueless anglers, fail miserably.

 

As to the “Hawgtrough” (I assume you mean an aquarium), fish like other critters can filter out stimuli that are found not to be dangerous. Lots of examples of this: Birds on airport runways, peregrine falcons nesting in downtown NYC, fish feeding despite constant heavy boat traffic, trout (same critter mentioned above that runs screaming at a slight footfall or shadow of a fishing line) in very heavily fished tailwaters that happily use wading anglers as current breaks to feed behind (but won’t take a fly –they just aren’t that stupid anymore)…. There are tons of examples of this. Fish in aquariums eat when they are hungry, but I bet, if you give a fish an electric shock everytime it attempts to eat Berkley GULP! you'll condition it (right term this time) right outta that. In fact, this type of thing has been done many times in fish behavior research. Fish can be “conditioned”. They aren’t robots –slaves to their instincts. They can learn.

 

I think lotsa anglers, when talking about the “pea-sized brain” of a fish don’t appreciate just how complex that pea actually is.

[Paul Roberts]

Great discussion! Until we can actually get inside the brain of a fish, we will NEVER know the answer. However, some rules never change. A bass is a predatory animal, that HAS TO take advantage of an opportunity to feed - it has no choice. This is especially true of the ice out through spring and the fall through ice up periods. This is why folks still catch bass on Hula Poppers and River Runts to this day. And on plain ole' red & white patterns.

 

I believe fish can be conditioned, but only for a short period of time. With any kind of lull in presenting a particular lure or bait, the bass will resort back to it's primordial instincts and proceed to feed opportunistically. Just the way I look at it. And I do NOT look at it very much. I'm more of the school of thought that any fish can be caught - regardless of the pressure it has to endure - by adhering to the basic premise of depth and speed control.

Fish do make "choices". They make them all the time. "Feed" or "Run and Hide" is a choice. But I do understand your meaning. But let's not fool ourselves and sell fish short. It may make us feel better, but I don't think it's accurate.

 

Yes, depth and speed control are primary. But it's not true that EVERY fish can be caught. A number of studies have shown that there is a percentage of bass in any given population that have been described as "uncatchable" or "immune to angling". And there are indviduals that are extra-vulnerable to angling. Fish are FAR from being simple robots.

[slonezp]

I am not suggesting they cannot be spooked. and agree it's a natural survival mechanism. Trout also tend to be spookier than bass. I agree fish can be conditioned to their enviroment, that's not the topic of the OP. Can they become conditioned to lures? The three basic rules for survival are eat, reproduce, and defense. Spookiness is a defense mechanism hence an instinct. Can a fish get spooked by a lure? Probably, but again, is that conditioning or instinct? Conditioning, in this case, as I understand it, is a bass won't hit a bait it believes to be a food source for fear of a negative experience. Now, I won't go to a restaurant where I've been served crappy food. Does a bass have the intelligence and abiltiy to identify a negative food source which appears almost identical to a natural food source???

[Paul Roberts]

I am not suggesting they cannot be spooked. and agree it's a natural survival mechanism. Trout also tend to be spookier than bass. I agree fish can be conditioned to their enviroment, that's not the topic of the OP. Can they become conditioned to lures? The three basic rules for survival are eat, reproduce, and defense. Spookiness is a defense mechanism hence an instinct. Can a fish get spooked by a lure? Probably, but again, is that conditioning or instinct? Conditioning, in this case, as I understand it, is a bass won't hit a bait it believes to be a food source for fear of a negative experience. Now, I won't go to a restaurant where I've been served crappy food. Does a bass have the intelligence and abiltiy to identify a negative food source which appears almost identical to a natural food source???

Ah! I see what you're getting at. I dunno. If it "believes the lure to be a food source" than I think it would be willing to try and eat it if its hungry or feeding or whatever. But I do think that fish learn to discern "food" from "not food". The fact that bass do become "educated" to a surprisingly high degree compared to unfished for bass, tells me they can distinguish this, and probably (due to lab studies on negative conditioning in fish behavior) even as negative. How long?? I can only take Keith Jones word for it. He says "months".

 

 

Does a bass have the intelligence and abiltiy to identify a negative food source which appears almost identical to a natural food source???

I don't think lures are very good at being "identical to a natural food source". Lures need to do something special in time and space, usually with the help of environmental conditions, to do us much good most of the time.

 

I fish shallow waters a lot and can often see hunting bass. But I don't catch them all. In fact, if we could see what goes on between most bass and our lures, even with depth and speed controlled, we'd probably hang it up.

 

I hear your point though, and do wonder where instincts, conditioning, and longer term learning separate.

[slonezp]

I don't think lures are very good at being "identical to a natural food source". Lures need to do something special in time and space, usually with the help of environmental conditions to do us much good most of the time.

Agreed, purely from a behavior standpoint, since many lures nowadays are visualy lifelike. So the fact that bass will still try to eat something which may not act naturally says a bass is not smart enough to be conditioned to a lure, OR instinct just overpowers its ability to discern good food from bad food.

 

 

 

On a side note, I'd  like to thank everybody who participated in this discussion.  

[DelfiBoyz_One_and_Only]

Agreed, purely from a behavior standpoint, since many lures nowadays are visualy lifelike. So the fact that bass will still try to eat something which may not act naturally says a bass is not smart enough to be conditioned to a lure, OR instinct just overpowers its ability to discern good food from bad food.

 

 

 

On a side note, I'd  like to thank everybody who participated in this discussion.  

X2 Thank everybody who participated in this discussion

 

I had no idea that this would generate so much interest and so many different point of views. I guess in a way everyone agrees to disagree. This is a awesome discussion and I hope some biologist get involved and study these allegations in further detail. 

 

Thanks again all. 

 

Jay-

[J Francho]

I'm having a chat on Facebook, with writer Rich Zaleski.  He reminded me that he did research and wrote a four part series on this very topic years ago for In-Fisherman magazine.  Here's what he had to say:

 

8000 words condensed into a few dozen.
Yes they do get conditioned. The easier a lure is to identify, the shorter its productive lifespan within any confined population of fish. IE, bright colors/distinctive vibration patterns attract bites when virgins, not so much after all the fish have been hooked on them a couple times. Simply put, it's easier for the limited mind of a bass to associate things with a high identity quotient with the stress of capture, than to decide that eating something that it can barely recognize is bad for it. They do NOT pass on these acquired avoidance tendencies to their offspring. But there's a whole separate issue regarding the wearing out of various patterns over generations of bass, that's too complex for this ultra condensed dissertation.

-Rich Zaleski

[Michael DiNardo]

I don't buy it.  If this were the case, I would never catch a fish on a black jitterbug, or a white spinnerbait.

 

Mike

[Hooligan]

It's been shown time and again that they do become conditioned. Not only to a bait but to specific sounds, and colors. If you can't condition largemouth or smallmouth, why is it that you can feed train them? 100% conditioning in the same way that they become conditioned to lures.

That said, it has also been shown that the one bait they never condition to is a soft plastic worm. Dr. Cook has shown it in studies for Berkley, the biologists at SDSU have shown it in captive and wild fish, Glen Lau filmed it hundreds of times.

No doubt in my mind that fish condition to specific baits. Zero.

[SuthernProg]

I don't know if they get conditioned or not, but do you think a bass would remember a bluegill if it slammed a hook in his mouth and body slammed him out of the water into a boat?

[J Francho]

Many pros speak about negative cues.  Things like pulsing the trolling motor, noises in the boat, bumping into cover, etc.  To a man, they say avoid this.  I'm wondering whether this simply spooks the fish, or is this part of fishing pressure, or a little of both?

[Michael DiNardo]

Many pros speak about negative cues.  Things like pulsing the trolling motor, noises in the boat, bumping into cover, etc.  To a man, they say avoid this.  I'm wondering whether this simply spooks the fish, or is this part of fishing pressure, or a little of both?

I believe this is the key, great post JFrancho.  It is not associated simply with the lures we use, but how our actions impact the fish and the surrounding environment.

[grampa1114]

Maybe that's why they put rugs in Bass Boats......who knew?

[wademaster1]

I think fish are conditioned to at least some degree.....but they still feed on their natural prey items, right? This means to me one thing. Use something that they can't distinguish as fake or alarming. Just because they're conditioned/spooked doesn't mean they're going to starve because of their past experiences.