WHO I FISHED WITH: This past Thursday morning, July 5th, I fished with returning guest Rick Snelgrooes of Liberty Hill, TX, accompanied by his son, Sean, Sean’s friend Grant, and Grant’s dad, Brian King. The Kings live in Orange County, CA, where Sean and Grant played soccer together before the Snelgrooes family moved to Texas a little over a year ago.
Rick Snelgrooes took the only hybrid striped bass during this morning’s trip. This fish, and a number of white bass suspended along with it, held in 31 feet of water over a deeper bottom and were very difficult to fool today..
From left: Sean Snelgrooes, Brian and Grant King, and Rick Snelgrooes, each with white bass which we either downrigged for or caught on tailspinners fished vertically.
WHAT WE FISHED FOR: This was a multi-species trip in which we caught white bass, largemouth bass, hybrid striped bass, blue catfish, and crappie.
WHERE WE FISHED: Stillhouse Hollow
WHEN WE FISHED: Thursday morning, 05 July 2018
HOW WE FISHED: Fishing was tough today. After a very light, short topwater feed right around (obscured) sunrise, the fishing slowed greatly and stayed tough all morning. Although we found several areas holding good concentrations of suspended fish, these fish would not budge when shown downrigged baits going horizontally, tailspinners and slabs going vertically, and live bait hung right at eye level. The majority of our fish today were taken via downrigging just one or two at a time. We did stop a number of times to try to tempt heavily schooled fish with vertical presentations and when we did score it seemed that the fish we caught were the minority nearer the bottom than out of the “masses” suspended above them.
OBSERVATIONS/NOTES: 1) With a northerly component to the wind today, fishing was slow and tough. On a number of occasions I encountered heavily congregated, suspended fish around 31 feet which we could not tempt with vertical for horizontal presentations, nor after fishing for them at several times over the course of the 5 hour trip. 2) Belton vertical temperature profile to 60′:
0 feet 82.9°
5 feet 83.4°
10 feet 83.7°
15 feet 83.7°
20 feet 83.7°
25 feet 83.4°
30 feet 82.6°
35 feet 77.9°
40 feet 72.1°
45 feet 67.1°
50 feet 64.3°
55 feet 62.8°
60 feet 61.5°
TALLY: 31 FISH, ALL CAUGHT AND RELEASED
TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:
Start Time: 6:10a
End Time: 11:20a
Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 72F
Water Surface Temp: 82.9F
Wind Speed & Direction: ENE5 or less the entire trip
Sky Conditions: Under 80-100% grey cloud cover
Water Level: 3.19 feet low
GT = 125
Wx SNAPSHOT:
AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:
**Area vic 929 downrigging in the vicinity of light, widespread topwater action
**Area vic B0082C – downrigging
**Area vic B0096C – downrigging and working tailspinners vertically
Bob Maindelle, Central Texas Fishing Guide
Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service
254.368.7411 (call or text)
Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com
E-mail: Bob@HoldingelleTheLineGuideService.com
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