Wheeler Crew — 82 Fish, Stillhouse, 14 March (AM)

This morning I fished the first of 12 planned “Spring Break Week” trips with the Wheeler clan.  Grandpa Cass Wheeler brought his grandchildren, 12-year-old Trinity Wheeler and 7-year-old Cash Wheeler, out to Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir for a morning in pursuit of white bass.

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Trinity was like a machine.  I showed her one time what to do at dockside, polished up her technique the first time we encountered fish, and she steadily reeled ’em in the entire time on the water.

Cash

Cash, like most 7-year-old boys, stayed engaged for a while, then needed “alternative assignments” to hold his interest.  So, he became my aerator-switch-operator, my net-man, and my check-on-the-health-of-the-fish-in-the-livewell representative.

After a bit of early morning searching, we got on fish around 8:20a and stayed on them right until 10:45 when both the kids and the fish played out.

We fished three distinct areas this morning.  The first area was on a flat, clean bottom over 34′ of water.  The second area was a gently sloping bottom going from 42′ to 45′.  Finally, as it got brighter and calmer, we moved out even deeper into 48′ and continued to vertical jigged for moderately concentrated fish.

The white bass we caught were heavily congregated near bottom, and therefore responded best to vertical jigging.  We used white, 3/4 oz. slabs the entire time this morning.

Once an area “played out”, I moved us very slowly a few yards in one direction or the other staying in the same general vicinity and, using sonar, stopped us right on top of the next patch of action we found.

We wound up with exactly 81 white bass and one largemouth this morning.

TALLY = 82 FISH, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:45a

End Time:  11:45a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 53F

Water Surface Temp:  64.1F

Wind Speed & Direction:  Under 5 mph from the SSW for the first 90 minutes, followed by an hour of NE5, followed by an hour of calm, followed by a steady breeze from SSW at 8.

Sky Conditions:  Fair skies with less than 5% cloud cover.

Water Level: 625.73 and has hit its crest and is now falling with 622.0 being full pool.  Water being released at 2161 cubic feet per second

Other: GT= 25

Wx SNAPSHOT (a graphical look at the forecast that faced us today):

14MAR16

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area   1716 — vertical jigging for heavily schooled fish in 34′.

**Area   1567/978  — vertical jigging for heavily schooled fish in ~43′.

**Area  1715 — vertical jigging for heavily schooled fish in ~48′.

 

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

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