The Invisible Light That Makes All The Difference

So if you haven’t guessed it yet, Glowing lures are kinda our thing, yeah they look cool and get your attention, which is great, BUT 

There’s actual science that backs up why they work so well, which is why we’ve incorporated them into so many of our colors, this one’s a little long and technical in the beginning but worth the read! 

First off I must clarify that there is no such thing as colored light, only light traveling in different wave lengths, measured in nanometers, that are picked up by special cones(color receptors) in eyes and then interpreted by the brain as color. Here's a quick break down of what our human eyes pick up: 

556nm = Red

535nm = Green

440nm = Blue

Here's a chart showing the different wavelengths and corresponding colors:

Now I believe it is also important to note that what makes something appear a certain color are the wavelengths that that object reflects off itself, for instance something that appears black simply absorbs most light waves that hit it and reflects a finite percentage of them, whereas something that appears red, absorbs all the wavelengths accept certain ones in the 550-700nm range, which bounce off of it and then into our eyes and that's what makes us interpret that object as the color red.(all eyes work this way)

The entire visible light spectrum ranges from 700nm(super bright red) to 400nm(blue-violet), this encompasses all shades, mixes & hues of the colors listed above. Beyond 700nm is the infrared spectrum and below 400nm brings us to the subject of this post, UV light, both of which are undetectable by our human eyes.

The Ultra Violet Spectrum(less than 400nm) peaks at 355nm and can only be detected by eyes that possess a 4th color receptor able to pick up light rays in this range of wavelengths.

Phew, now that we got all that out of the way and to keep this from being such a dry, statistic laden read, from here on I'll simply refer to the colors, just keep in mind that all the colors represent are a specific range of wavelengths that our brains interpret as those colors. 

Now to why UV light matters so much, see light behaves differently when traveling through water than through air, to put it simply, certain colors get filtered out faster than others due to absorption, reflection & refraction, red gets filtered out first, then green, then Blue, lastly purple(violet). (more on this later) 

We humans, as large mammals, only have 3 color receptors in our eyes, able to detect red, green & blue, which make up lots of colors, but not all. (Many large carnivores like dogs & big cats only have 2 receptors, unable to see the color red, which is what fuels the “dogs are colorblind” myth, but I digress)  

To the contrary, in order to adapt to the lack of light under water, many marine creatures posses a 4th color receptor, which enables them to detect light in the Ultra Violet spectrum(<400nm), a range of light that we are incapable of detecting (until we get sunburnt #gingerprobs)

This UV light also just so happens to be the LAST color that’s filtered out when the suns rays reach the water, which means it penetrates deeper than all other light rays, AND more importantly to our shallow water fisherman, it travels further laterally than all other light, which gives predators that can detect this UV light a yuuuge advantage because they can detect their prey from a further distance due to the reach of UV light rays reflecting off their prey. (Funny how evolution works, huh?)

As the sun’s rays reflect off of your lure, the light bouncing off of it will only travel so far before it’s filtered out depending on what color your lure reflects(remember this is how color is interpreted) To clarify, lures don’t just disappear underwater if you’re far enough away that the colored light is filtered out, they just appear black/greyish.

Our glows are “charged up” by absorbing UV light, which allows them to glow in the dark, but more importantly, they reflect it. Which is a lot more natural (in the marine world) than it sounds, take these images of a Damsel fish for example. (Got these off David Attenburough's "Life In Color" Documentary on Netflix, it's great)

See how it appears bright yellow to our eyes, and then semi-miraculously completely changes to a bright pattern of spots when viewed through a camera designed to pick up Ultra Violet Light. Fish are able to see this, we are not, this is what our glows imitate!

Pretty neat huh? 

So basically, say you have a red lure and a blue lure, both placed equal distance & depth from a fish and that fish is moving towards those lures, approaching both at an equal rate from a distance great enough that it can detect neither color, as it moves closer it is going to detect the blue color first because the blue wavelengths travel further in the water than the red ones, the red lure will simply appear black or greyish until the fish is close enough to pick up on the red. (which might be what they like, who knows, I know all the red & white rhymes, I’m not saying red doesn’t work, just bear with me) 

Now suppose you switch that red lure to a red one that’s exactly the same, except now it also glows red, now, that fish is going to detect the red color first because the UV light rays reflecting off that glow travel further through the water than the blue light rays reflecting off the blue lure that doesn’t glow, catch my drift?

If you can increase the distance at which a fish can detect your bait, then theoretically you increase your chances of getting that fish’s attention, which theoretically, again, increases your chances of that fish striking your lure by a certain margin, even if it’s only 1%, it’s still something! 

So hypothetically let’s say that using a glow that reflects UV light, increases your odds of detection by 5%, and then when you couple that with our signature garlic scent that also say increases your chances by another 5% and then add those on top of the right profile and action of the lure giving it another 5%, maybe you also add in a cork or a rattle of some kind to get some noise & vibration and that adds another 5%, well you get the point, it just keeps compounding your % of chance for success in a world where ABSOLUTELY NOTHING IS GUARANTEED.  

This is the overall thought process behind our baits, pack in every advantage possible in order to do everything we can to increase your odds of success on the water.

Make sense? If it does you should really give them a try and see how much of a difference they make for you first hand, 

A great place to start would be our Glowing Colors Box Combo, it’s got 12 packs of our top glowing colors in a sweet waterproof tackle box, you can check it out here,

Till next time,

-M.