This past Saturday afternoon, May 6th, I fished a birthday trip for eight-year-old Luke Phillips, accompanied by two of his buddies, Colby Anthony and Brooks Hull, as well as Luke’s dad, Will Phillips.

The birthday party, from left, Colby Anthony, Will Phillips, Luke Phillips, and Brooks Hull with a sampling of the white bass they caught on slabs in our last hour on the water, from 5:15 to 6:15pm.

Brooks pulled in the largest fish of the trip this evening, a 3.25 pound, 18.50 inch hybrid striper that fell for a slab.

Due to Will’s work commitment, we had to adjust the timing of this trip around his work schedule, which put us fishing from 2:30 to 6:30 PM.

Given the boys’ age, I knew it would be important to introduce a variety of tactics and transitions during the trip so as to keep their interest and help them be successful.

We began by downrigging which produced eight fish, followed by shallow water sunfishing which produced five more fish, and then we closed with working vertically for deep, heavily congregated white bass using a smoking tactic.

This was the first time this year where the fish were active enough to respond to a smoking tactic versus the easing tactic that has been necessary up to this point. I noted that the water surface temperature went from 70 to 74 from morning to evening today. At our one and only area that produced white bass on the smoking tactic, we took our fish count from 13 up to 66. Two of these fish were legal hybrid, both landed by Brooks while fishing right in between his two buddies, literally 4 feet away from both of them.

Some guys have all the luck!

TOTAL = 66 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time:  2:30p

End Time:  6:30p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start:  80

Water Surface Temp:  74F

Wind Speed & Direction:  S10

Sky Conditions: Fair and cloudless

Water Level: 0.65 feet above full pool and falling; 1592 cfs release at Belton Dam

GT = 0

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area  473 through 1584 – downrigging for white bass – 8 fish

**Area  166 – slipfloats for sunfish – 5 fish

**Area  1940 – smoking for white bass – 53 fish

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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