Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations water color & bass color?

does water color have anything to do with the color of the fish, like darker water, darker fish.. etc... i cuaght two seperate bass out of the same lake, one was really dark, no black lines just all over body was dark, the other was almost silver,.. water was stained, two ft visiblity. then cuaght another bass same day out of a really clear pond, visibility 3-4ft and he had all the lateral markings..

any ideas?.. 3 different strains of fish?

thanks ya'll

chris

Christopher, at one time I fished a small city lake that was continually brown with mud. The fish were pasty white. No color.

Suspended clay (muddy water) will cause what you describe. My pond is still growing, and during the process has looked like chocolate milk during excessive runoff. Beautiful fish from my fathers pond now look like pale fish in mine. My question is, once the water settles do the fish regain their color ? And how long does it take to return to normal ?

Not separaate strains. Bass and most other fish "take on" the body color or hue to match and blend in to their surroundings. Exception is fish with poor or failing eyesight. They always take on a very dark "stand out" hue. Poorer their eyesight the darker they become.

What about small mouth bass? They're called bronzbacks in the infertile mountain streams & lakes but turn green in more fertile water. Am I correct to deduce from this that if I want bronzbacks I have to have an infertile pond, or is this a different strain of SMB?

I don't know Ric. I've seen different colored smallmouth from the same body of water. As a taxidermist I have to ask the customers what color phase their smallmouth was as they vary so much.

My warmwater pond has smallmouth and they were a drab green when I had a strong algae bloom , however recently the water cleared up drastically and they became a little lighter with striking markings. Most of the smallmouth I see in my area which is primarily natural lakes have a green color to them.

When I lived in South Louisiana, I learned to do as the natives do, and to call largemouth bass "green trout." Indeed, they were almost always remarkably green.

The bass in my North-central Alabama pond are only sometimes and somewhat green, more often various shades of sliver to dark. Perhaps the difference is that the water in S. Lousiana is generally green and that there is a year-round abundance of green aquatic plant life.

As best I remember, the bluegill and shellcrackers were the same color there as here.
Lou

My largemouth are very light in color when the water clarity it low whether it's an algae bloom or turbid water from clay particles.

i bet bill's right... the darker fish was caught of some structure we put in there off the bottom.. the others were in shallow water feeding!..

chris

i was just courious

My experience with LMB color is in agreement with others - very light color when caught in deep or off-color water - prominent lateral line with dark markings when caught in shallow/clear water.

An interesting observation for small mouth bass - a few years ago I "donated" a six pound smallie to a local tackle shop aquarium. When fed crawdads or shad she would "light-up" with strong vertical bars.

My experience has been the clearer the water, the more vivid the color/markings on the fish. I fish a lot of clear gravel pits, catch beautifully marked bass and crappie, then muddy stock tanks and reservoirs where I catch pale, sometimes almost white LMB.
I've seen bass change their hue in a matter of minutes after putting them in a holding tank.