Atmospheric pressure and bite activity

Started by JasonGotaProblem, June 02, 2023, 05:26:08 PM

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thrasher

As an East coast South Floridian offshore fisherman, my buddies and I have a saying. Winds out of the West stay home and rest, winds out of the East prepare for a feast. Not sure why but when the ocean is at its nastiest the bite is alive

JasonGotaProblem

Quote from: thrasher on June 03, 2023, 12:39:04 PMAs an East coast South Floridian offshore fisherman, my buddies and I have a saying. Winds out of the West stay home and rest, winds out of the East prepare for a feast. Not sure why but when the ocean is at its nastiest the bite is alive
Interesting. I remembered seeing on the fishbrain website the lovely nursery rhyme "winds from the west fishing is best. Winds from the east fishing is least." And "winds from the south blow bait in fishes mouth. Winds from the north do not go.forth."

But that's clearly not universal.
Any machine is a smoke machine if you use it wrong enough.

thrasher

Funny, I was talking with a bass fisherman once and he quoted the same thing as you. I know you're on the West coast so it's probably opposite but a West wind here makes the ocean flat as a lake. Good for a boat ride but you really have to work to find the fish. Just a local point of view and like you said, not universal.

Also had a discussion with that bass guy about atmospheric pressure. Something about relaxing the pressure on the swim bladder which releases pressure on the stomach which makes the fish hungrier than normal. Sounds good in theory but who knows, the bite does seem to be good before a storm rolls through.

JasonGotaProblem

#18
I'm convinced that there's a lot of bad advice out there that continues to circulate only because it rhymes.

"Beer before liquor never been sicker, liquor before beer youre in the clear"

If youre already quite buzzed on the slow stuff and you start on the fast stuff you'll probably have a bad time. But i had friends growing up who were convinced that it guaranteed if they had a beer earlier in the day they couldn't ever drink a mixed drink at night or they'd yak.

"He who smell't it..."
Any machine is a smoke machine if you use it wrong enough.

Midway Tommy

The best way to identify trends is to keep a diary/log with all the pertinent information documented, barometric pressure, temp, wind direction, cloudiness, humidity, etc. After a decade or two of documentation you will be able see trends and calculate success based on that information. I know a few guys that do it and it actually works, but I'm too lazy to invest the time and effort it takes to be thorough with it so I just add the info to my hippocampus for later use.  ;)  Problem is, the older I get the more that area is getting overloaded so sometimes the info is a little tough to sort out.  ;D

I do know that in freshwater fishing, fishing is generally pretty darn good when you have an extended fair weather period and also good just prior to a front coming through and the day after, but pretty darn bad for about four days after the front passes. Also, on average, some type of front passes through about every five days or so, so the trick is to figure out how to catch fish on those less desirable fishing days.  ;)
Love those open face spinning reels! (Especially ABU & ABU/Zebco Cardinals)

Tommy D (ORCA), NE



Favorite Activity? ............... In our boat fishing
RELAXING w/ MY BEST FRIEND (My wife Bonnie)

Gobi King

Does not matter what I look at and try to trend it out, fish seems to bite 2x a day,

Before I get there and
After I leave!

Shibs - aka The Gobi King
Fichigan

philaroman

what, no one sprinkled in a little thermocline, yet?  :o

just for poops & giggles, let's make it wind-blown...  "diagonal" rather than horizontál

Keta

For kokanee light penitration is more of a factor.  On clear days they tend to go deeper,
 often below the thermocline and into colder water.  The fishes metabolism slows down and they become sluggish and not as prone to bite.  I also  THINK light penitration has more effect than pressure for most fise and I KNOW rapid temperature changes do.

As for pressure a few inches vertical movement changes pressure far more than even the worse front and I realy can not see it efecting fish that much.

Moon phases.... I think it is feeding related, if they are feeding at night they are not going to be eating as much during the day.  This is just a guess though.
Hi, my name is Lee and I have a fishing gear problem.

I have all of the answers, yup, no, maybe.

A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way.
Mark Twain

jurelometer

#23
Quote from: thrasher on June 03, 2023, 12:39:04 PMAs an East coast South Floridian offshore fisherman, my buddies and I have a saying. Winds out of the West stay home and rest, winds out of the East prepare for a feast. Not sure why but when the ocean is at its nastiest the bite is alive

Larger fish can swim more easily in moving water that pushes smaller fish around.  A feeding opportunity if there ever was one.  I believe it has something to do with how water molecules attract each other. Some microscopic critters actually crawl through water, because for them, it is like a sludge.  For a whale, the opposite.  [correction- while the previous is correct,  the main benefit in this situation comes from simply being larger- fish can cover  some multiple of their body length per muscle contraction/tail swipe- the bigger the fish the longer the distance, and therefore a big fish can move faster than a small fish, countering the effects of current]

QuoteAlso had a discussion with that bass guy about atmospheric pressure. Something about relaxing the pressure on the swim bladder which releases pressure on the stomach which makes the fish hungrier than normal. Sounds good in theory but who knows, the bite does seem to be good before a storm rolls through.

Not buying this one.  First of all when the atmospheric pressure drops ahead of the storm, the swim bladder would be at a relatively  higher pressure and would therefore expand.  Secondly,  the fish is slowly and continuously adjusting the amount of oxygen in the swim bladder, and the atmospheric pressure change is happening at a relatively slow rate.

Thirdly, if the fish move a couple inches higher or lower in depth, the swim bladder  would immediately grow or shrink  (at least for awhile until readjusted) the same amount as  would be caused by barometric changes from a  weather event.  So fish would be constantly be going between being hungry and full as it swam around and/or small waves passed overhead. Not possible to survive like that.  We covered the swim bladder thing in more detail earlier in this thread.

It is common to mistake correlation for causation.  On the saltwater flats, fish will often eat better when the wind whips up a bit, and also when it gets overcast.  Trout in streams will go on the bite when it gets overcast, and especially at the beginning of some rain (which dumps flying insects onto the water).  These events often correspond with a drop in barometric pressure, but that doesn't mean that the pressure change was the actual cause. 

Another story: the most insane wide open multi-species bite that I have ever witnessed  was the first couple of calm days after a small hurricane passed through the Sea of Cortez.  My guess is that the bite  wasn't the result of barometer rising, but the fact that it was too rough for the inshore fish to feed for a couple days, and they were hungry. 

-J

Gfish

#24
Hmmm, so when a fish ralfs-up its gut contents on the way up from deep water, it might be the swim bladder quickly expanding to push out the stomach stuff.
Then again a "shock trauma" reaction in people, after an accident is to vomit-up the stomach contents...
Fishing tackle is an art form and all fish caught on the right tackle are"Gfish"!

Keta

Quote from: Gfish on June 03, 2023, 05:27:30 PMHmmm, so when a fish ralfs-up its gut contents on the way up from deep water, it might be the swim bladder quickly expanding to push out the stomach stuff.
 :ct

Yes
Hi, my name is Lee and I have a fishing gear problem.

I have all of the answers, yup, no, maybe.

A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way.
Mark Twain

oc1

#26
Fish definitely respond to a falling barometric pressure.  Part of my job used to be keeping red drum broodstock in large indoor tanks with temperature regulation and an artificial light cycle.  They would gradually be bought through artificial "seasons" by manipulating the light and temperature regime.  When the artificial season reached fall conditions fish would be full of eggs and ready to spawn.  However, the actual spawning event would not occur until there was a falling barometer; something we could not control artificially.

A falling barometer is an indication that a storm is coming.  All animals react to it.  Deer feed earlier in the day and longer so they can hunker-down and wait out the storm. Elementary school teachers say that their class will be especially unruly on days that the barometer is falling.   It is always a good time to go fishing because the bite will be on.

In Hurricane Alley you should always prepare for a storm early so you are free to go fishing when the barometer starts to fall.

JasonGotaProblem

This was fun. Barometer very low today
Any machine is a smoke machine if you use it wrong enough.

jurelometer

#28
Quote from: oc1 on June 03, 2023, 06:56:18 PMFish definitely respond to a falling barometric pressure.  Part of my job used to be keeping red drum broodstock in large indoor tanks with temperature regulation and an artificial light cycle.  They would gradually be bought through artificial "seasons" by manipulating the light and temperature regime.  When the artificial season reached fall conditions fish would be full of eggs and ready to spawn.  However, the actual spawning event would not occur until there was a falling barometer; something we could not control artificially.

A falling barometer is an indication that a storm is coming.  All animals react to it.  Deer feed earlier in the day and longer so they can hunker-down and wait out the storm. Elementary school teachers say that their class will be especially unruly on days that the barometer is falling.  It is always a good time to go fishing because the bite will be on.

In Hurricane Alley you should always prepare for a storm early so you are free to go fishing when the barometer starts to fall.


Sorry, still not buying it. You have some coincidental data, and no causal mechanism. It does not make sense that a species would not spawn until a weather event happened that could take weeks or even months in extreme cases.

Here is one reference from a scientific paper (published in Fish and Fisheries) on what makes a fish vulnerable to capture by hook -  https://www.fecpl.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Lennox-et-al.-2017-FishFish.pdf:

It is often suggested that fish can sense changes in barometric pressure and modify behaviour accordingly (Guy, Neumann, & Willis, 1992; Heupel, Simpfendorfer, & Hueter, 2003;| 7LENNOX Et aL. Jeffrey & Edds, 1999; Mallekh, Lagardere, Anras, & Lafaye, 1998). There is, however, a lack of consensus on this (e.g., Anras, 1995; Schulz & Berg, 1992) and the only direct test of barometric pressure changes on fish vulnerability found no relationship in northern pike (Kuparinen et al., 2010).

Changes in barometric pressure are small and slow relative to the changes in hydrostatic pressure experienced by fish during even small vertical movements.
For example, the pressure difference from swimming upward ~10 cm in the water column is equal to the change in barometric pressure from a typical high to low pressure system (Ikegami et al., 2015; Northcott, Gibson, & Morgan, 1991).

Responses to barometric pressure are reactions to other weather changes or possibly to other weather changes correlated with changes in barometric in a predictable way (Cabanellas-Reboredo et al., 2014; e.g., infrasound)


Same point that I was making - there is too much continuous pressure change going on in the fishes natural environment to make detection of a very small  change over a long  period of time plausible. Nevertheless, there are hundreds of sportfishing articles that treat this claim as some sort of proven fact.

On land, the situation is different due to the much lighter density of air. Very little air pressure variability  assuming that you are not drastically changing elevation (like hundreds of feet at least), or sticking you head out of a speeding car window for hours.  Barometric pressure change could be detected, and therefore acted on.

Quote from: JasonGotaProblem on June 03, 2023, 07:04:27 PMThis was fun. Barometer very low today

Nice!

Success was most likely due to your lucky hat, lucky socks, or both.

-J

philaroman

the fish don't have a barometer...  neither do I...  SPORTSMANSHIP!!!  :D