fissure_man Posted January 19, 2017 Posted January 19, 2017 If an eyeless, brainless bear s**ts in the woods, is there any moonlight? You can absolutely measure and discuss light without any assumption about brains, whether belonging to humans or fish. If I want to measure the temperature of a pot of water, I don’t have to stick my hand in it, I can use a thermometer. The temperature is the temperature. Underwater light is underwater light (including UV, X Rays, whatever – all measureable). I don’t see what the confusion is with this. 4 Quote
Super User J Francho Posted January 19, 2017 Super User Posted January 19, 2017 24 minutes ago, fissure_man said: I don’t see what the confusion is with this. I think the confusion lies in what each eye can physically detect, and what that brain connected to that eye can perceive. No one really knows, though some assumptions can be made. The rods and cones aspect tells me more about why bass are very active during crepuscular periods - dawn and dusk - and their ability to adjust to changing light levels, and seeing "better" than their prey, but I'm not so sure specific color plays as big a role as bait companies will have you think. 3 Quote
Super User WRB Posted January 19, 2017 Super User Posted January 19, 2017 Go online and search "animals that can see ultraviolet" just might open your eyes! Tom 1 Quote
Super User J Francho Posted January 19, 2017 Super User Posted January 19, 2017 Aren't UV rays one of the first wavelengths to get filtered out by water? Most of what I've seen is bunk science, coating an object with some phosphorescent coating, and shining a black light on it to show you what something might see. Total fake science. Now, some older red paint getting replaced by another red paint, and all of sudden the lure doesn't work.....I've heard that tale before, and I believe there may be something to it, something we can't detect, but perhaps the fish do. 1 Quote
fissure_man Posted January 19, 2017 Posted January 19, 2017 16 minutes ago, J Francho said: I think the confusion lies in what each eye can physically detect, and what that brain connected to that eye can perceive. No one really knows, though some assumptions can be made. The rods and cones aspect tells me more about why bass are very active during crepuscular periods - dawn and dusk - and their ability to adjust to changing light levels, and seeing "better" than their prey, but I'm not so sure specific color plays as big a role as bait companies will have you think. Fair point. We don’t know exactly how bass eyes work, and we REALLY don’t know how their eyes and brain might work together to come up with ‘preferred’ colors. But it’s pretty clear that bass have some sort of light-based vision, and there are plenty of anecdotal claims that color preferences exist, at least in some circumstances. Assuming that bass vision is facilitated by light (including UV, potentially), why not study the lighting conditions in their environment? The light present underwater is what allows them to see whatever they see, even if we don’t fully understand it right now. Why the controversy? Lol Random claims of “I caught a bass in the middle of the night on an XX colored worm, therefore all science involving light measurement is bogus!” …. are ridiculous. 15 minutes ago, WRB said: Go online and search "animals that can see ultraviolet" just might open your eyes! Tom Ultraviolet light. If bass can see ultraviolet light, then measure UV underwater too! How is that any different? 1 Quote
Super User WRB Posted January 19, 2017 Super User Posted January 19, 2017 My point is simple, the human eye can't detect UV or infrared IR without aides, pas serine birds, about 1/2 the bird population, salmon, butterflies can. I have never read a study on LMB specific to their ability to see UV. However over 60 years experience supports the basses color spectrum is far better then ours. Tom 1 Quote
fissure_man Posted January 19, 2017 Posted January 19, 2017 5 minutes ago, WRB said: My point is simple, the human eye can't detect UV or infrared IR without aides, pas serine birds, about 1/2 the bird population, salmon, butterflies can. I have never read a study on LMB specific to their ability to see UV. However over 60 years experience supports the basses color spectrum is far better then ours. Tom That may be true, who knows? Be careful, making claims about bass color perception is a sure way to get scolded around here We know one thing: bass can't see light that is not present. Figuring out what types of light are and are not present underwater is a step toward decoding your 60 years of anecdotal evidence. What's unscientific about that? Nobody is claiming they have all the answers. 3 Quote
Super User scaleface Posted January 19, 2017 Super User Posted January 19, 2017 14 minutes ago, WRB said: My point is simple, the human eye can't detect UV or infrared IR without aides, pas serine birds, about 1/2 the bird population, salmon, butterflies can. I have never read a study on LMB specific to their ability to see UV. However over 60 years experience supports the basses color spectrum is far better then ours. Tom That may very well be true and a bass may perceive red completely different than us but the fact is a red lure , apple or fire truck will only reflect red light if it is being hit by red light . Quote
Super User WRB Posted January 19, 2017 Super User Posted January 19, 2017 13 minutes ago, fissure_man said: That may be true, who knows? Be careful, making claims about bass color perception is a sure way to get scolded around here We know one thing: bass can't see light that is not present. Figuring out what types of light are and are not present underwater is a step toward decoding your 60 years of anecdotal evidence. What's unscientific about that? Nobody is claiming they have all the answers. 13 minutes ago, fissure_man said: That may be true, who knows? Be careful, making claims about bass color perception is a sure way to get scolded around here We know one thing: bass can't see light that is not present. Figuring out what types of light are and are not present underwater is a step toward decoding your 60 years of anecdotal evidence. What's unscientific about that? Nobody is claiming they have all the answers. Look up Ultraviolet sensitivity, Scold away! Tom Quote
fissure_man Posted January 20, 2017 Posted January 20, 2017 On 1/19/2017 at 4:57 PM, WRB said: Look up Ultraviolet sensitivity, Scold away! Tom The scolding comes from @Catt , in my experience. I looked up ultraviolet sensitivity, and learned why some people get sunburnt easier than others lol. Also lots of research on birds, fish, and spiders with UV-sensitive eyes. Nothing about why a scientist would need to know anything about bass biology, eyes, or brains, in order to measure light underwater. UV vision for bass might be plausible, I’m not trying to disprove it. Like you said – there doesn’t appear to be much research for LMB. But there is evidence that bass can see portions of the same visible spectrum that we can, so observing how those wavelengths are transmitted/absorbed isn't irrelevant. Perhaps they can see UV as well. If bass are sensing UV light with their eyes, then ‘color’ from a bass perspective becomes pretty abstract to the human mind. (I think this is what all the fuss is about ) It’s abstract, but it can still be studied without breaking any 'rules' of science. If bass can see UV, it would raise some interesting questions/thoughts: Should we put any stock in the UV-reflective lures and lure coatings that are available? The claims made by those companies are backed by ‘research’ that seems very tough to find, and some of the promotional material is nonsense. But as a concept it makes sense to me. A UV-reflective surface would stand out to UV-sensitive eyes, for the same reason that a red-painted surface would stand out to red-sensitive eyes (as long as there’s UV [or red] light around to be reflected). You could also take the other approach to maximize visibility, by choosing something that does not reflect UV light at all, to create a strong silhouette against a backdrop of 'bright' UV illumination. This is the same effect that makes solid black lures stand out in most any water condition, at least to human eyes. Maybe this is what all our regular lures do all the time (how UV-reflective is a normal soft plastic or hardbait)? Of course, maximising visibility is not necessarily a good thing – but you could flip these approaches to minimize visibility, or anywhere in between. “Matching the hatch” becomes more abstract as well. Instead of visually (read: “humanly”) matching the look of the prey you’re imitating, why not match the reflectivity of all light wavelengths? What does a craw 'look' like underwater, to a critter whose vision is fully or partially based in UV? UV comes from the sun, and at night the predominant light source is reflected light from the moon. How reflective is the moon when it comes to UV light vs. other wavelengths? IE: is UV proportionally less present at night (or the opposite, maybe)? And lastly, as an extension of Scaleface's chart, how is light (of all wavelengths) transmitted and absorbed through water of varying clarity, turbity, etc? In what scenarios is underwater lighting dominated by blues, reds, UV, etc? Quote
Super User Paul Roberts Posted January 20, 2017 Super User Posted January 20, 2017 On 1/17/2017 at 9:12 PM, mixel said: I've been noticing this winter millipedes crawling on the shore. They are predominately medium brown in color with tan colored stripes between their bendable structure. Kind of similar to the pic below. Am now looking for a plastic that has similar color and pattern. I have to think the bass must love these things and those 100's of tiny feet moving must be attractive. Interestingly, I did some research on Millipedes and just in California alone, there are 226 species! This is not my pic but it's kind of similar in color to the ones I've been seeing. Most millipedes have chemical defenses, exuding irritants that would likely make them poor critters to mimic. 1 Quote
contium Posted January 20, 2017 Posted January 20, 2017 On 1/19/2017 at 5:16 AM, Catt said: To the human eyes & brain red " disappears" under water (actually changes color) but yet it's highly productive. It's not "to the human eyes & brain". Red is filtered out period. Drop a spectrophotometer over the side of a boat and this can easily be measured. There is no interpretation going on. Quote
Super User Catt Posted January 20, 2017 Super User Posted January 20, 2017 1 hour ago, contium said: It's not "to the human eyes & brain". There is no interpretation going on. That's funny right there! The spectrophotometer Invented itself... Right! Quote
fissure_man Posted January 20, 2017 Posted January 20, 2017 58 minutes ago, Catt said: That's funny right there! The spectrophotometer Invented itself... Right! Flawless logic: The spectrophotometer was invented by humans, therefore it can only 'see' what humans see. Humans invented x-ray imaging, therefore humans have x-ray vision! Who knew? 2 Quote
Super User Team9nine Posted January 20, 2017 Super User Posted January 20, 2017 Holy cow, are we really going here again lol. I like Hackney's comments in his newest Bassmaster column which pertains to the color subject (YMMV): Quote It’s a common scenario: Someone comes back to the dock with a certain lure tied on in a certain color and tells everyone how many big bass he caught. Right then, usually within 5 minutes, some of the anglers who didn’t catch many run to the local tackle shop to buy a handful of the same lures... The whole situation would be laughable, if it weren’t so sad. I’ve fished a day or two during my lifetime. I can tell you that it’s rare — like never — that bass are keyed on a specific bait in a specific color. ...and on the UV subject, I've never seen a study supporting UV vision to any degree in mature bass, and I've read a few The best work being done in this area is by a guy on the East coast, but he hasn't tackled common freshwater fish yet. He has done several saltwater species as well as a few crossovers like striped bass. Again, doesn't mean that's an absolute, just that I'm not putting any stock (or $$) into sales pitches for UV baits of any kind for bass at this point in the game. -T9 3 Quote
mixel Posted January 21, 2017 Posted January 21, 2017 7 hours ago, Paul Roberts said: Most millipedes have chemical defenses, exuding irritants that would likely make them poor critters to mimic. Dang, just when I think I have it all figured out. 1 Quote
Super User Paul Roberts Posted January 21, 2017 Super User Posted January 21, 2017 1 hour ago, mixel said: Dang, just when I think I have it all figured out. Quote
Super User Catt Posted January 21, 2017 Super User Posted January 21, 2017 On 1/19/2017 at 3:23 PM, fissure_man said: Random claims of “I caught a bass in the middle of the night on an XX colored worm, therefore all science involving light measurement is bogus!” …. are ridiculous Aint nobody made that claim but you! And by the way y'all never answered that question because ya can't! 1 Quote
Super User Paul Roberts Posted January 21, 2017 Super User Posted January 21, 2017 15 hours ago, Team9nine said: Holy cow, are we really going here again lol. I like Hackney's comments in his newest Bassmaster column which pertains to the color subject (YMMV): ...and on the UV subject, I've never seen a study supporting UV vision to any degree in mature bass, and I've read a few The best work being done in this area is by a guy on the East coast, but he hasn't tackled common freshwater fish yet. He has done several saltwater species as well as a few crossovers like striped bass. Again, doesn't mean that's an absolute, just that I'm not putting any stock (or $$) into sales pitches for UV baits of any kind for bass at this point in the game. -T9 Yes, holy cow. I was gonna duck this entirely. But, there is some relatively new stuff on UV vision in rainbow trout adults that had gone undetected by previous investigations. I got into that discussion on a trout site. Of course the guy bringing it forward appeared to have some investment in the idea so he ran a bit far with his conclusions. Then there was some very old work done on yellow perch (1980's) -which originally were known to use UV only when very young- that found UV sensitivity in adults. Use? Unknown, but social reasons were suggested (something I suspect for both rainbow trout and possibly bass). As to lure color, I pretty much go with Hackney's take, for lots of reasons I've shared here over the years. But, I will also... never say never. Quote
fissure_man Posted January 21, 2017 Posted January 21, 2017 18 hours ago, Team9nine said: Holy cow, are we really going here again lol. I like Hackney's comments in his newest Bassmaster column which pertains to the color subject (YMMV): It would be really cool for a top pro to go all in on the 'color doesn't matter' stance - fish nothing but merthiolate colored baits for a tournament season. Maybe they’d do just as well as ever? It would be a cool experiment. For most people you might think there’d be a confidence handicap, but if they are truly convinced it makes no difference… I suspect sponsors wouldn’t be thrilled about an experiment to convince anglers they don't need to buy 10 colors of each bait. Then again, as in the Hackney quote, maybe that experiment would just have the masses running out to stock up on more merthiolate 7 hours ago, Catt said: Aint nobody made that claim but you! And by the way y'all never answered that question because ya can't! Catt, this debate will go nowhere until you open your mind lol. If scaleface's light penetration chart (or any other research on light transmission/absorption) was presented in a forum on physics, marine ecology, tuna fishing, etc., would you dispute it on the basis that we don’t understand bass eyes/brains? It has nothing to do with bass. Your stance is akin to disputing the theory of gravity, because a 200 lb angler feels more gravitational force than a 5 lb bass. Even if we had a perfect understanding of bass vision, translating that into situation-specific lure color preferences (that may or may not exist) would take another huge leap of understanding. We know that. Explanations of bass color preference are conjecture (still interesting, but we should take them with a few grains of salt). Measurements of light underwater are not. Measuring and understanding light underwater is a step toward piecing together what bass “see.” 3 Quote
Super User Team9nine Posted January 21, 2017 Super User Posted January 21, 2017 8 minutes ago, fissure_man said: It would be really cool for a top pro to go all in on the 'color doesn't matter' stance - fish nothing but merthiolate colored baits for a tournament season. Maybe they’d do just as well as ever? It would be a cool experiment. For most people you might think there’d be a confidence handicap, but if they are truly convinced it makes no difference… I suspect sponsors wouldn’t be thrilled about an experiment to convince anglers they don't need to buy 10 colors of each bait. Then again, as in the Hackney quote, maybe that experiment would just have the masses running out to stock up on more merthiolate Would be a fun experiment. I've seen several pros argue they keep color selection simple, but I've also seen the garages and tackle collections of several, and they're anything but simple or selective. I've played around with such things on the water myself just for amusement. For instance, one day I brought only my shallow crank box with me. Tied on a snap (which I rarely use but wanted quick lure changes), then went fishing. The caveat being every time I landed a fish on a bait, I had to drop it in the boat (the bait) and change to another bait (color, size, brand). No using the exact same bait twice. I believe I ended up catching bass on 21 of the 23 different variations of baits/colors/depths/vibrations I got to try that day. It's a good way to prove to yourself that some of the small details aren't as critical to success as some make them out to be. -T9 2 Quote
Super User the reel ess Posted January 21, 2017 Super User Posted January 21, 2017 Notice black is good for dirty water even on bright days. And there are darks on the chart for clear water/cloudy days. Thus, dark colors have 3/4 of the spectrum covered. When they aren't the go-to, it'll be quite obvious. It's a sunny day with gin clear water. So watermelon or punkin is in order. I find these almost interchangeable so I can probably boil my plastic choices down to two bags of each bait...maybe three. That said, I still fish watermelon/orange or red flake in stained water with good success, especially when bass just aren't reacting. The less reactive they are, the more I want a natural color and/or a smaller size. At least that's how I see it. 1 Quote
Super User RoLo Posted January 22, 2017 Super User Posted January 22, 2017 The color 'red' has the longest, sloppiest light wave in the light spectrum. As a result, ‘red’ is the first color to be absorbed and scattered by air and water. By the same token, a 'red lure' soon becomes a 'black lure' when the water depth is increased or when the sun goes behind a cloud. On the opposite end of the light spectrum is "violet", the shortest, most penetrating light wave. This lends to the fact that our sky and our hydrosphere are dominated by blue hues. As a lure descends into the darkness of depth, is 'blue' the last visible color? VISIBLE TO WHO? Based on the human experience, light waves longer than ‘red’ comprise invisible light, which we call ‘infrared’. Inversely, light waves shorter than ‘violet’ are also invisible light, which humans call ‘ultraviolet’. Man has learned from creatures in the ocean’s abyss, that visible light is not the same for all living creatures. So in the final analysis, we’ve only reaffirmed the fact that man cannot see through the eyes of a fish. Roger 2 Quote
fissure_man Posted January 22, 2017 Posted January 22, 2017 52 minutes ago, RoLo said: The color 'red' has the longest, sloppiest light wave in the light spectrum. As a result, ‘red’ is the first color to be absorbed and scattered by air and water. By the same token, a 'red lure' soon becomes a 'black lure' when the water depth is increased or when the sun goes behind a cloud. On the opposite end of the light spectrum is "violet", the shortest, most penetrating light wave. This lends to the fact that our sky and our hydrosphere are dominated by blue hues. As a lure descends into the darkness of depth, is 'blue' the last visible color? VISIBLE TO WHO? Based on the human experience, light waves longer than ‘red’ comprise invisible light, which we call ‘infrared’. Inversely, light waves shorter than ‘violet’ are also invisible light, which humans call ‘ultraviolet’. Man has learned from creatures in the ocean’s abyss, that visible light is not the same for all living creatures. So in the final analysis, we’ve only reaffirmed the fact that man cannot see through the eyes of a fish. Roger It’s off topic, but the sky isn’t blue because blue light is most penetrating – it’s the opposite. Light transmissivity is different in air vs. water vs. ozone vs. glass etc. Earth’s atmosphere scatters blue-ish light much more effectively than red, so much of the blue light that would otherwise ‘shine’ overhead in the middle of the day is scattered down to our eyes. At the end of the day (sunset), we only see what’s left of light that’s travelled on a long trajectory through the atmosphere, which is why the sunset appears ‘redder’ (blue light has been scattered away). Behavior in pure water is different, and blue-red hierarchy of ‘visible’ light transmissivity is well known. Bass rarely (never) live in pure water, so we consider other environmental effects. The effect of turbidity, stain, etc on light transmissivity depends on wavelength, sometimes to such a degree that the usual hierarchy of ‘penetration depth’ is altered. Yes, most of these charts and studies focus on 'visible' light, but the same logic can be extended to and tested on light waves of any frequency. We are certainly capable of measuring light that we're unable to see, and studying bass physiology gives us insight into what they might be capable of seeing. If we learned about the eyesight of creatures in the ocean’s abyss, why couldn’t we do the same for bass? 1 Quote
Super User RoLo Posted January 22, 2017 Super User Posted January 22, 2017 Granted, blue light is scattered by dust, ions and solid particles. But when traveling thru liquid matter alone, light penetration hinges on the wavelength of the color. Be all that as it may, biologists have yet to learn how colors, especially those in the ultraviolet spectrum, might appear in the eye of a bass. The two references below deal with 'water penetration' as it applies to different colors in the light spectrum. ==================================================================== NASA Government Education (Scroll down about a foot) https://disc.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/education-and-outreach/additional/science-focus/ocean-color/oceanblue.shtml Why is this transparent water the bluest ocean water? There are two major optical processes by which ocean water and substances dissolved or suspended in ocean water, interact with incoming light from the Sun. The two processes are absorption and scattering. In the atmosphere, the main reason that the sky is blue is due to the scattering of light (more about this process can be found in the Science Focus! article “It’s Not Easy Being Normal”, in the section on Rayleigh scattering). In the ocean, the primary way that water interacts with light is absorption, and water absorbs different colors of the visible spectrum better than others. Water preferentially absorbs red light, and to a lesser extent, yellow and green light, so the color that is least absorbed by water is blue light. < Visit Website To View COLOR PENETRATION Diagram > This diagram shows the depth that light will penetrate in clear ocean water. Because red light is absorbed strongly, it has the shallowest penetration depth, and blue light has the deepest penetration depth. ==================================================================== NOAA (Another Interesting read from another reliable source) http://oceanexplorer.noaa.gov/facts/red-color.html Roger 1 Quote
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