Fluorescence and Wild trout

[Malcolm]

Just wondering what forum members think of fluorescents for wild trout.

For myself I refuse to fish with fluorescence in my flies believing that it scares wild fish off particulaly in clear water. The colour that I particularly hate is green. So flies like a green-tailed kate or conventional montana nymph have to be tied with non fluorescents for me to have any confidence in them.

[.D.]

I routinely use Datam Globrite crimson (shade 3) floss for dry flies with a red butt or tail. I don't think it costs me any fish, far from it.


.D.

[IrishFloatTube]

I am very happy using a sight speck, or in other words an attention grabber.
The natural preyfish have a noticable eye, jungle cock is well proven over hundreds of patterns, and yellow against black another proven formula.
The golden pheasant topping of bright halo-like gold is also proven, and almost fluorescent in look.

I think in terms of a successful imitation of a food item being a combination of :
colour + shape + linear movement + internal action movement.

What I next want is for my particular one to get noticed as a greater distance than the naturals in their drab protective camouflage,.
So I deliberately sacrifice one of the above features to enhancement and caricature it larger/brighter/livelier than life.

For example my pattern might be bigger, or brighter, or a stronger silhouette in low light, or a flashier version in bright light.
But I don't embellish more than 1 or 2 features at any time, to avoid the "scary xmas tree" reaction.

Where fluorescent materials come in for me, is a bright spot at the head or tail and the rest is imitative.
Sometimes I have a couple of strands of fluo in a wing or tail and that's enough.
It's no different to a jungle cock eye, or a bivisible white hackle, or a tinsel component really, if used sparingly.

[Wildfisher]

Has anyone ever caught a  decent sized trout a green tailed Kate? Biggest I?ve had on it is probably about a pound, if that. I have caught lots of bandies on it.

[.D.]

Has anyone ever caught a  decent sized trout a green tailed Kate? Biggest I?ve had on it is probably about a pound, if that. I have caught lots of bandies on it.

I've heard rumours that people have caught decent sized trout on fag-ends and the Peter Ross.

[Wildfisher]

I've heard rumours that people have caught decent sized trout on fag-ends and the Peter Ross.

I'd wager that most were on the  fag-end.

[garryh]

i dont believe it does any harm.ive caught many decent sized trout using fluoro especially on loch leven.my biggest fish on dunalister was caught on a clan chief with a fluorescent yellow and red tail.

cheers Garry
ps big leven browns like pink.

[lochstyle]

one of the early season , flies to have in orkney is a peach muddler, Very bright!  Its got glo-brite no.s 7 and 8 chopped and dubbed for the body and a tail of a mix of the two.
Col

Yes i have great success on the above fly especially in bright weather with the only difference being i use glo-brite no5 and 8 which seems to work better for me.
Lochstyle

[Fishtales]

I believe ultraviolet plays a big part in how fish see food. Lots of animals emit fluorescence under ultraviolet light. I read somewhere that hare and seal fur, which we use a lot in our flies, fluoresce for those animals that can see ultraviolet.

I found this.

http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/primer/techniques/fluorescence/gallery/japaneseponybellyhair.html

This explains how fish 'see' ultraviolet, although it is discussing deep sea fish where light is, for us as humans, non existent.

http://www.halibut.net/What-Fish-See.htm

This also discusses how fish see ultraviolet light.

http://jeb.biologists.org/cgi/content/full/211/9/ii

For me this says use fluorescent material if you are fishing deep or in dark coloured water as the fish will home in on the fluorescence.

[muddler54]

blae and black wi a green flu butt always got me a brownie.....
  saved many a blank especially when the lochs stirred up and a bit dirty