After a successful day of scouting yesterday on Decker Lake (a.k.a. Walter E. Long Reservior) east of Austin, near the Austin-Bergstrom Airport, I guided Mr. Clint Murphy to some of the highest quality schooling largemouth action I’ve ever witnessed in Texas.
Clint Murphy with the largest of 24 largemouth we boated today, all on topwater. This 3.75 pound largemouth regurgitated 4 medium sized threadfin shad at boatside and was evidently hungry for more as he took Clint’s topwater bait.
Right as the topwater bite died, we got downriggers down and worked over the “scene of the crime” for still-active fish that were willing to feed, but not willing to do so up on the now-bright surface. Clint caught these hybrid at the same time on an umbrella rig.
When Clint contacted me several weeks ago, our intent was to fish Stillhouse as a first choice or Belton as a second choice. Clint considered these both close enough to visit frequently and aesthetically pleasing enough to want to spend time on them, and so he desired to learn to fish them as he re-entered the sport after a 10 year hiatus.
Fishing was so good on Decker yesterday, however, that I felt my “fiduciary responsibility” to him as a client was to at least let him know what I’d experienced and give him an opportunity to cash in on the same.
In approximately 5 hours of fishing yesterday, fishing buddy Bruce Shuler and I put exactly 30 fish in the boat, the majority of which were stocky 15-17 inch largemouth bass which readily hit our shad-imitating lures as they fed aggressively in open water on schools of shad. Typically, when one encounters “schoolie” largemouth, they are smaller fish going 12-14″ and around 1.25 pounds or less. Definitely NOT the case right now on Decker!!
As Bruce and I drove home yesterday I called Clint and extended the offer to fish Decker; he asked for some time to think it over. A few hours later he replied by text, “Not in me to pass on a chance of that good of a bite.” And so the trip was on.
As we spoke during the trip, Clint said he weighed two things: the excitement in my voice over the fishing, and my willingness to spend more time and fuel getting to and from Decker in order to make this trip happen on his behalf.
As the day dawned, we were not disappointed. Yesterday’s fishing began at 7:56a, today, the fish really started today around 8:20a. Before the schools of bass began to coalesce, I kept an eye out for “early risers” and for shad, and, in so doing kept our downrigging gear in the mix with hybrid striper that were hanging down at 14-17 feet, ghosting along under the shad. We boated two short hybrid before the largemouth action began.
When the frequency of topwater strikes grew, we easily transitioned into throwing topwater baits and stayed on the fish for about 90 minutes as the action rose, peaked, plateaued, and then rapidly died off.
During the most intense time in the feed, the fish were willing to hit larger topwater baits — our clue to this was the fact that, on a number of occasions, while using a Cork Rig, the fish struck the cork instead of, or in addition to, the shad imitator we had trailing the cork.
As the bite died, we returned to downrigging quickly to get baits in front of still-active, but descending fish now holding deeper in the water column. We boated a double on hybrid and two single largemouth in the next 40 minutes before things died for good.
Our tally today included 24 largemouth bass and 4 hybrid stripers. Only one largmouth bass went under 1.25 pounds, with several exceeding 3.5 pounds, and the largest pulling the certified Boga Grip down to the 3.75 pound mark. This is very exciting fishing requiring good reflexes, good accuracy, and good distance casting, all of which Clint possessed and improved on as the day unfolded.
TALLY = 28 FISH, all caught and released
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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:
Start Time: 7:15a
End Time: 11:45a
Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 78F
Water Surface Temp: 84.6
Wind Speed & Direction: SSE4-6
Sky Conditions: Fair skies, <10% cloud cover
Other: GT= 130
AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:
**Area 1597-1598 – topwater began ~8:10 and ended ~9:45; downrigging before and after
**Area 1599 – 1600 – scattered, sporadic topwater in last 30 minutes of trip.
Bob Maindelle
Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service
254.368.7411 (call or text)
Salado, TX
www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com