Night Fishing Small Streams

[Dirtworm]

I did some fishing after dark yesterday on a small creek I am becoming familiar with. My complete lack of success led me to wonder if you must take a different approach at night.

Heck, I don't even know how well fish see in the dark. Do you use more visible colors? Do fish target different food at night? I realize just because I didn't catch anything this one time at night it doesn't mean the game changes completely, but it got me thinking. I quickly realized wade fishing at night is problematic - unless you know the water you are walking really, really well.

[Jack Jones]

I have no answers for you but that experience tells me it is helpful to say what you were fishing for if you want to have the wisdom of the ancients bestowed on you, LOL.

Wading in the dark is always a scary proposition, even if you know the water.

[Mitch f]

I did some fishing after dark yesterday on a small creek I am becoming familiar with. My complete lack of success led me to wonder if you must take a different approach at night.

Heck, I don't even know how well fish see in the dark. Do you use more visible colors? Do fish target different food at night? I realize just because I didn't catch anything this one time at night it doesn't mean the game changes completely, but it got me thinking. I quickly realized wade fishing at night is problematic - unless you know the water you are walking really, really well.

Topwater baits work well, Buzzbaits, jitterbugs. Be sure to wear ear plugs at night so you don't set the hook prematurely on the blow up. Big Black spinnerbaits with colorado thumper blades also work well. In general, use bigger baits and work the baits slower than normal.

[ozark trout fisher]

It's a little late in the year for night fishing, though you might have a few more good nights for it with these above average temps. During the summer I love to run Black Jitterbugs at night. Old school and it works.

[Dirtworm]

Interesting that black baits work at night - certainly blows up my theory of using the grub jigs so bright and gaudy they would make a 14 yr. old girl wretch. I was fishing in a small stream that holds lots of pumpkinseed, green sunfish, largemouth bass, etc.

[Al Agnew]

I've always fished streams at night during the summer...never tried it during the autumn. But I suspect it should work as long as the water temps are still above the mid-50s.

Bass can still see to some extent, at least well enough to see surface lures. But they are also good at locating moving objects by hearing and vibration (through their lateral line). This has to be true because I've caught too many lake largemouth in deep water on plastic worms at night. There is no way enough light penetrates to 15 feet at night to make them able to see those plastic worms. So rest assured they CAN sense your lures.

They will move shallower at night than where you'd ordinarily find them during the day. Shallow flats lined with water willow weedbeds can be very good.

[TArcher]

If your targeting bass and wanting a good buzz bait pick up a 3/8 oz. War Eagle buzz bait with black skirt and gold blade. They have a distinct sound. Bass hear around home tear these things up! But yes use dark colors at night, blacks, purples, etc.

[aftersh0ck]

Says your in arnold

May I ask what creek it was?

[Dirtworm]

Says your in arnold

May I ask what creek it was?

It was Rock Creek. My new home away from home.

I may have to try some of these suggestions, thanks for the specific suggestions on the jitterbugs and the war eagle. I will have to check those out next time I find myself buying fishing lures (it just sort of happens sometimes).

[Al Agnew]

Black is good at night in topwater lures and shallow runners that the bass will be looking UP at. They will be seeing the lure against the background of the water's surface and sky above, which is the lightest part of their nighttime environment, so black stands out against the relatively lighter background. "Bright" colors are not bright at night. You might remember the Moody Blues song, "Nights in White Satin", in which one of the lines was "Cold-hearted orb that rules the night...removes the colors from our sight...red is gray, and yellow white...but you decide which is right, and which is an illusion". That's a near perfect description of colors at night above the water, as we humans see them, and it probably describes the fish's eye view as well. Point is, a bright color like yellow or chartreuse will simply look light gray or "white" to you when you pull it out of your tackle box in the moonlight. So if the fish is looking up at it, seeing the shadowed underbelly of it, the fish is seeing something gray against a gray background.

If you're fishing a lure that runs in mid-depth, or even on the bottom in fairly shallow water, the most visible color you could use would probably be pure white. In that case the fish is seeing it against a dark gray background of the water looking horizontally, or the mottled medium to dark gray to black background of the moonlit bottom of the stream. Black still shows up against that background, but not very well. Medium colors and patterned colors, like realistic crawdad colors for instance, will be more or less invisible against that kind of background, and that would hold true even if it's a "bright" patterned color like fire tiger. The colors disappear into grays, and the pattern makes good camouflage.