Granted these colors are super visible with a lot of contrast and will provide you with plenty of strikes, but for me personally considering river Sava, where I fish, is fairly clear river during winter. I mainly go with „dirty“ brownish or green patterns, especially during day time.

As you will notice on the photos, most of the jigs is rigged with rubber attached to the hook. My Masterclass explains how you simply can make this rig. Watch by clicking on this link – MASTERCLASS WEEDLESS JIG

Nice one on the Ribworm in Motor oil during sunny day

First of all, a bad color in the right place and the right time is always better than good color in an area where there is no fish. So, it will always be about finding fish and then making the right slow hoovering presentation. If you do this, your shad, or grub can be pink with red hearts flake and rainbow color back. It will not matter to feeding fish.

However, there are days when you know fish are concentrated in a certain area and getting that one or two bites is all you can expect in a day of fishing.

Notice the difference in bright VS dark colored lure on the riverbed during a sunny day. The light reflecting from a bottom is something you must keep in mind.

Notice the difference in bright VS dark colored lure on the riverbed during a sunny day. The light reflecting from a bottom is something you must keep in mind.

In my experience, brown shades will appeal better to finicky fish and this will result in more bites throughout a day or season.

River Sava water clarity is quite clear with greenish hue. In this kind of water greenish patterns that blend with water will work awesome and for me choosing best colors will be always be blending with either water color or blend with bottom. So, your motor oils, ragworms, dirty Roach or natural patterns.

Darker colors will catch them in low light conditions as well

As you look into the river, you may feel, the you go deeper the less penetration of the sun will be and therefore you will need brighter colors when bottom fishing. The truth is that the bottom type of where zander live, are often sand or clay. You do not find a lot of zander on a muddy river or lakebed. All these bottoms are bright and therefore reflects sunlight, meaning during sunny days, it will be lighter near the bottom than higher in the water column.

I found this out in empirical way by tying on a zander lure and connecting it to Water Wolf camera.

As the bait was sinking, I could see light fading, but then as the bait was approaching bottom the light became progressively stronger and visibility on the bottom was better than mid-range depth. Bright colors looked so unnatural on the bottom as it was glowing and every detail on the bait was visible. On the other hand „dirty“ colored baits blend with bottom a lot better and in my mind this will trigger a lot more bites.

Another biggie on the 14 cm Sandeel Curtail in Ragworm

I will go as far as fishing same lure though-out the season. I will just alter my jig head size to get that perfect bottom contact. I threw almost exclusively 14 cm Sandeel Curltail in 2015, Cannibal Shad in glitter bug in 2016/2017, vertical fishing with green belly Monster Slug in 2018/2019 and this year, what I will turn towards is more or less going to be the 11 cm Ribworm in motor oil. To be honest, I did not notice there was a difference in my catching ratio either of these years other than general season offsets.

Brown patterns are also great in pike and perch fishing also due to connection to weeds, brownish waters and similar bottoms.

Hope this perspective will help you choose a darker colored lure over a bright one in the future as I`m sure it will get you some extra strikes.

The rubberband makes a non weedless lure weedless. Watch the Masterclass HERE