Sunday, February 20, 2005

Understanding a Fish

Like all forms of wisdom, the best way to comprehend something is insight into the essential nature of what you are focusing on. This is true of fish, and to comprehend well is to simply look at your species and say, " why do they look this way", while at the same time remembering your fish has become what it is BECAUSE IT NEEDED TO.

The protractile mouth of the bonefish, mojarra or the golden trevally exists because of the evolutionary needs of bottom rooting and grazing. The bonefish's double anal fin helps not just steer it, but it makes on ongoing shallow depth sensor. The black drum's poorer vision- smaller eyes-is helped by chin barbels that help sense the bottom. Why do pelagics like all the billfish, tunas, dolphin have forked tails or bills? Simple..they need to traverse longer feeding distances in the seemingly endless blue water. Billfish herd baitfish into balls when they are able, and whack their quarry with their bills.This saves lots of pursuit time and energy.

When you use lures for a species, do 3 things
1.Match the hatch
2.Make your lure behave like the real thing
3.Be sure your lure action matches the feeding style of your target species, as well as THEIR
CURRENT FEEDING MOOD.

Jan

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