![]() ![]() ![]() The pelicans had left, and upon a closer look, I realized that the carcass wasn’t missing…it was actually alive with more than a dozen crayfish completely covering and eating every square inch of it.Īfter getting a feeling for the volume of invasion for these exotics, and having ever since had smallmouth, walleye, pike, and even perch spew orange in the water, on the boat, and on my person, I’m convinced that fish species everywhere are increasingly choosing them as a preferred forage item. One carcass was missed by the feathered brigade, and sitting in a foot or two of water, but I had to grab something on the boat before I could dispose of it.Īfter a few minutes I returned to see it gone. It wasn’t until we cleaned some fish and my kids fed some of the remains to the local pelicans that it started to click for me. Not just any crayfish, but the highly invasive rusty crayfish.īright, blaze orange shells and claws filled our livewell, and after draining and removing the fish, its contents looked more like the aftermath of a Louisiana crawfish boil than a fishing trip. No matter where we fished, and no matter what depth, these fish were coughing up crayfish carcasses. Why Orange? That next summer, on a trip to Lake of the Woods’ Ontario side, I fished with famed guide Dan Schmidt to try out a few new lures and wrinkles on some reef fish. That statement seriously piqued my curiosity. It was that way this past summer with all of our jig fishing and now it’s carried into the winter.” “You need anything with Orange, and if your spoon doesn’t have it, on a tough bite you won’t get bit. Seeing is believingĪ few winters ago, I talked to Josh Bullivant, avid angler, guide, and manager of Trapper’s Landing Lodge on Leech Lake. Here’s my take on the surge in popularity of those tones, and why you should look towards them, especially in certain systems. Manufacturers have responded, creating a number of new colors that are variations on the same riff. Recently there have been increasing fishing reports that specifically call out orange as a “must-have” color. For the most part, that included rocky river systems and their impoundments which did have an abundance of crustaceans. It started years ago for me with crayfish patterns being something I continued to choose as a confidence color no matter where I fished. Similarly, the color orange and its various hues are becoming fashionable in my tackle boxes for a variety of predator species. The saying, “the new black” comes from its use in the 1980s where the color black became a go-to for fashion designers looking for a versatile staple that could work with anything. Orange is the new black across much of the walleye world…. ![]()
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