Ask two anglers for their opinion on lure color, and you may get two different answers. But the general consensus is that silver or chrome spoons perform best on bright sunny days with clear conditions and gold or painted spoons are best for cloudy days or stained water.
The reasoning is fairly simple. On a sunny day when the water is clear, the sun’s rays penetrate deeper, allowing a silver spoon to retain its reflective qualities at surprising depths. Mirroring the reflection of a shad’s scales, the bait is easy to find and even harder to ignore. However, in the sun’s absence or murky water, silver falls way down the list in terms of its ability to stand out.
The easiest thing to do would be to pocket some gold or painted spoons for just such an occasion, but they’re less likely to be carried in your local tackle shop, and it wouldn’t be hard to just plain forget. In this dilemma, a resourceful angler has options.
Guide Chris Bullock finds that painting one side of his spoons with white fingernail polish gives it that certain something to be seen in low-light situations, and he said it will actually out-produce a gold spoon. But there is another idea to try on the water.
It’s fairly common for anglers to keep a bottle of Spike-It plastic lure dye in their tackle box or boat for spicing up worms and jigs. But in a pinch, a quick dunk in the bottle will give your spoon a makeover that can make your day. Chartreuse is the color most-commonly associated with the brand, and it gives the spoon the closest resemblance to gold. The built-in garlic scent is an added bonus.
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