The great worm mystery, solved! (Theory)

[Paul Roberts]

7 minutes ago, Joshua Vandamm said:

Worms don’t swim. They’re hardly ever in water unless there’s a mud slide. 

 

Untrue here. Half of their early life is still in fresh water. 

 

The pic above is from Rock creek. A freshwater tributary here on the Potomac. 

My take away is fish eat them. Basically nothing else to the story. 

There are quite a few aquatic worm species. But guess what? (My son would respond 'chicken butt!'; He's just about cured me of saying 'Guess what?') Nightcrawlers are not even native here! 

 

Oh! Yes, I remember "black/brown eels" being in ocean tribs. But... I wonder when and how far they move inland. It's true that bass were originally from the backwaters of the Ohio River/Great Lakes and tribs (post-glacial, when the waterways were bigger). Possibly some could have had access to elvers?

 

"My take away is fish eat them. Basically nothing else to the story." That's something we can all agree on! But, there's always more to the story!

 

[MIbassyaker]

30 minutes ago, Joshua Vandamm said:

My take away is fish eat them. Basically nothing else to the story. 

 

Oh, for sure -- its just funny: "my little snakelets"..."my black beauties". He seems to have been looking forward to the day when a dinner of eels was only a few casts away. It's not clear the population ever reproduced here, however, whereas anadromous transplants and visitors -- both desired and undesired -- have, including steelhead and sea lamprey.

 

In any case, I don't share the puzzlement over worms, given the variety of things bass will so readily eat. It has never struck me as a difficult problem in need of a special solution.

[Mobasser]

I think plastic lures look like the basic shape of bass foods. They don't need to resemble anything exactly.Bass are predators and eat anything that looks good to them. I've caught lots of fish on a bucktail jig with pork rind or plastic trailers. It resembles crayfish in length and size,  but that's it. It doesn't look exactly like a crayfish. The ned rig is a great lure for bass, but doeasnt look exactly like anything. Bass hit plastic worms because the move slowly,  look alive, and are an easy target for predator like bass.

[FishDewd]

I'm pretty sure around here the bass think that worms resemble... well, worms! We don't get eels.

[jbmaine]

 

 

 

 

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Worms

 

 

 

 

 

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Worm Flies

Worms are a staple in the diet of most fish that live in moving water. Trout in rivers consume worms, especially during periods of high flows when helpless worms are swept from the river bed or from eroding banks. Worms come in a variety of sizes and colors. There are both earth worms (worms that burrow into soil) and aquatic worms (worms that burrow into a steam or lake bed). There are also worms that are transitional, which can live in both terrestrial and aquatic environments. Most earth worms seek out soils that have high moisture contents, which means that lake and stream margins get high priority from worms at all times of the year.

Worms occur in dense populations in many silty stream and lake beds. Worms also occur in the bottoms of fast moving gravel bed rivers. During times of floods, catastrophic drift can expose many worms to waiting trout. During these high water periods a San Juan Worm drifted along the bottom can be deadly. On local rivers "the worm" is a very productive fly during winter months or any time the river rises due to flash floods. Aquatic worms come in a variety of colors ranging from tan to red. Often a fake worm fly that is brighter colored than real ones will produce more strikes, especially when the water is turbid. Be sure to have several colors of worms in your fly box. Stomach autopsies on hatchery steelhead have revealed that they also eat worms, even during the coldest winter months.

 

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[Raul]

1 hour ago, MassYak85 said:

The reason bass eat worms is the same reason guys catch bass on 12" trout lures in lakes not stocked with trout....it looks alive and it will fit in their mouth. 

 

1 hour ago, MassYak85 said:

The reason bass eat worms is the same reason guys catch bass on 12" trout lures in lakes not stocked with trout....it looks alive and it will fit in their mouth. 

 

1 hour ago, MassYak85 said:

The reason bass eat worms is the same reason guys catch bass on 12" trout lures in lakes not stocked with trout....it looks alive and it will fit in their mouth. 

 

[WRB]

Leeches not eels.

Lots of dermasel bottom dwellers that are bass prey that include worms.

Tom

[Darren.]

Man, some feisty little nuggets on this thread, LOL.

 

It is a "theory", after all  

 

My local reservoirs here in VA have an abundance 

of the slimy critters. I've caught some. Too many!

[Deleted account]

6 hours ago, scaleface said:

They are difficult to get the hook out because of all the slime .

We use them to live line for striped bass, cobia, and even tuna. A rag and a little sand makes handling them a whole lot easier. 

[Joshua Vandamm]

I’m just curious about this stuff. Anyways Berkley’s official position...stumped. They say bass don’t eat worms often if at all. 

http://www.berkley-fishing.com/Berkley-ae-why-do-bass-eat-plastic-worms.html

 

 

[Darren.]

54 minutes ago, reason said:

We use them to live line for striped bass, cobia, and even tuna. A rag and a little sand makes handling them a whole lot easier. 

Sand! That's an idea I haven't heard before. Then again, I 

haven't used them in the salt yet (for striper). Probably all

the striper fisherfolk here in VA know that trick. I'm new to

the striper game.

 

I scoffed at my buddy who offered me his rag when I caught

my first eel in one of the reservoirs I frequent. That was a

mistake.

 

Mistake yet to be repeated. Sand is a great idea.

[Joshua Vandamm]

23 hours ago, Delaware Valley Tackle said:

I don't think baits look "like" anything to a bass. They don't have the capacity to reason or think. They run off pure instinct. Anything with a profile, action, size and color to maybe be edible will draw strikes. 

They do think. Not like we do but they have fairly long term memory. 

7 hours ago, Mobasser said:

I think plastic lures look like the basic shape of bass foods. They don't need to resemble anything exactly.Bass are predators and eat anything that looks good to them. I've caught lots of fish on a bucktail jig with pork rind or plastic trailers. It resembles crayfish in length and size,  but that's it. It doesn't look exactly like a crayfish. The ned rig is a great lure for bass, but doeasnt look exactly like anything. Bass hit plastic worms because the move slowly,  look alive, and are an easy target for predator like bass.

Bass especially big bass, learn what to eat and what to avoid from instinct and experience. I agree about 50% but I do think there’s a prey image engrained for every effective Lure other than reaction strike baits. Caddis fly larvae looks like a ned rigs imo. 

[RB 77]

20 hours ago, Gundog said:

Well now you know but its too late because the mystery has been solved therefore there is no more mystery. 

 

Just one more thing...

[Gundog]

19 hours ago, MassYak85 said:

The reason bass eat worms is the same reason guys catch bass on 12" trout lures in lakes not stocked with trout....it looks alive and it will fit in their mouth. 

^^^^Bingo. Bass don't have large brains. They think about survival and reproducing. They would hit a beer can with a hook on it. Its us who over-think things. 

[Deleted account]

On 3/18/2018 at 2:14 AM, Raul said:

There ain’t no eels where I live, the nearest ocean is 350 miles away, our rivers only carry water during 6 months, the rest of the time they are bone dry.

 

So nothing applies .....

 

No anguillas? One never knows how fish get around, true story, dad had another of his ideas in (I want to say) '73. We drove down to South America (Actually to Panama, and flew the rest of the way, darn Darien Gap). Did a lot of fresh water fishing all the way down, but that's not my point. Anyway, somewhere in the Mexican desert, I forget where, in the midsts of the mountains and cacti, there were these tiny creeks and puddles and I saw a couple of small, maybe 2" fish. It took a while, but I managed to get one with a makeshift net, and I kept him in a jar. Now the rest of this is hypothetical and heresay, but I may or may not have kept it alive, and traveled across several international borders with it, and it may or may not have turned out to be an endangered pup fish, and it may or may not  have been released in or about an engineering marvel.

[Joshua Vandamm]

On 3/19/2018 at 11:45 AM, reason said:

No anguillas? One never knows how fish get around, true story, dad had another of his ideas in (I want to say) '73. We drove down to South America (Actually to Panama, and flew the rest of the way, darn Darien Gap). Did a lot of fresh water fishing all the way down, but that's not my point. Anyway, somewhere in the Mexican desert, I forget where, in the midsts of the mountains and cacti, there were these tiny creeks and puddles and I saw a couple of small, maybe 2" fish. It took a while, but I managed to get one with a makeshift net, and I kept him in a jar. Now the rest of this is hypothetical and heresay, but I may or may not have kept it alive, and traveled across several international borders with it, and it may or may not have turned out to be an endangered pup fish, and it may or may not  have been released in or about an engineering marvel.

Good to save an endangered animal. Maybe not so good to transplant it... point taken tho. How do bass end up in little ponds with no streams or nearby lakes? “Life finds a Way”. 

I promise you eels are no different. They just arnt equiped to survive as long.