Why would one choose to fish with just yarn (variety of colors) and no eggs or bait? Is one better than the other?
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Bait is much better than yarn by it's self. I'd rather flyfish than use yarn alone! But hands down, bait will outfish all techniques with the right water conditions.
There's nothing wrong with adding yarn to a bait setup for extra color, just tie a small piece of orange, pink, or chartreuse yarn to the baitloop to enhance to brightness of your presentation but I'd only recommend that is colored water.
Keith

M.S.,

I like to fish without bait when there is alot of smolts,trout or even suckers that won't let you finish a dift in an area without stripping you.

In some places like the Vedder River in BC I would say yarn/wool ties alone work ten times better than roe/shrimp or any other bait. It doesn't matter whether you bounce bottom or float-fish, the Coho and White Chinooks up there bite better without it.

On the other hand, I've been in areas where bait's a must especially steely's. It all boils down to CONFIDENCE and superstition!

I fish just yarn and a hook alot. There are times when you're fishing the "slot water" that is really ripping and you need to get behind that certain rock/tree ect..and bait just takes longer to get to the bottom due to the mass of it all. I try to keep it scented up though. When you're fishing a boulder field--it's the hot ticket at times especially when the fish are real spooky due to low water and spinners run em off!

I think people have the confidence issue with bait for the most part. The only thing that Bait has proven to work better on to me is summer run steelies. For everything else it dosent really matter. Ive outfished expierienced guys just throwing corkies, worms, jigs, rags, when they are using good eggs shrimp/rags, shrimp/jigs.

The fish might hold on a little longer with bait but initially it dosent matter.

the bait issue is just like the barbed hook issue.

Just my opinion.

I have seen alot of snagers use just a small piece of yarn. but not everyone who uses only yarn is a snager.


dc

I think it all depends on what your going for I personally think that silvers will hit anything well at least lately and steelhead like the pink pearl corky or an aero fly but bait still beats all other methods if you think about it.