“One of my earliest memories was my father teaching me how to cast a net for baitfish, and then rigging them on a hook to catch bass.” - Robert Castaneda, Founder of Livingston Lures

An avid collector of fishing lures as a boy, Castaneda experimented with his baits’ effectiveness by altering the color patterns or adding glitter or feathers. Ever curious, inventor Castaneda began studying the natural sounds of baitfish: mating calls, defense sounds, and indicators of distress. He soon zeroed in on distress sounds of baitfish as they ‘ring a dinner bell,’ so to speak, for large game fish.

KNOWLEDGE IS POWER

Castaneda continued his research of baitfish sounds to identify the origin: the swim bladder. When fish compress their gill plates, the muscles that move them beat against their swim bladders, known as drumming, which puts out a unique sound based on each fish's biological makeup. These sounds travel indefinitely in a water environment, far past the vision range, and can alert other fish that they are prey and entice hungry predatory fish or that they are predator fish and initiate a distressed signal for the prey to flee. (Generating the distressed noise because the gills flex more rapidly, resulting from the muscles moving faster and drumming on the swim bladder faster.) The swim bladder also acts as a resonating chamber to enable fish to hear. A fish’s lateral line detects sound vibrations and its inner ears pick up higher frequency sounds. Together, the three help the fish locate food and detect predators. Using this knowledge, Castaneda founded Livingston Lures and lures featuring sounds that attract a variety of predatory game fish.