I am in complete agreement especially when it comes to lure particulars and how their used used.Why cant the fish just eat the same bait every day?
Yesterday I took along a family relation that never caught fish on lures. At first he thought I was going to give him lures to try that looked like forage. I gave him a quick lesson in what and why fish bite based on what Ketchn wrote and he went on to prove it to himself. This was his first fish hitting in open water, caught on a bright white flat-tail that struck the lure 3x on the same retrieve:
With another lure similar in action but different in color he caught two of the largest yellow perch of the day:
I caught most of my fish - including some 11" crappie - on this Crappie Magnet-tail/thicker body hybrid (note the chartreuse tail and motor oil body):
It mattered what we cast because of my confidence in those lures and colors. As long as I found fish, we could have used one or 10 different soft plastic lures in different colors and caught fish. We were only out 3 hours, but except for needing to learn the uni-knot, he now knows from experience the basics of the small soft plastics on light jig heads and that fish location is everything! No doubt when he fishes waters near Phillie (where he's moving to), casting these lures from his kayak he'll catch fish once he finds fish.
Some lure types my be more miss-than-hit depending on a combination of many different factors. But when it comes to fish activity, I never assume fish are actively feeding / prone to striking whatever splashes down. In his case he caught fish a few times as the lure was hanging down in the water in a stumpy location in 4' while he sipped water. When I noticed his rod tip twitch I told him to pick up the rod and be prepared for the strike. Sho' enough - fish on! In fact three of his fish were caught with him imparting no action including lifting his jig off bottom to cast it again.
The other thing is using the lure(s) that caught fish but stopped and casting other confidence lures in the same water and locations to see strike number comparisons. If other lures work better, Ketchn's statement is proof why based on lure action, size, shape and maybe color. Even a slight change in lure action can make all the difference.