Fished a half-day morning “S.K.I.F.F.” trip on Stillhouse with brothers Logan H. and Ethan H., of Harker Heights. This was the second S.K.I.F.F. Program trip that I’ve run. S.K.I.F.F. stands for Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun. The Austin Fly Fishers (AFF) have commissioned me to take the children of soldiers deployed in harm’s way and the children of soldiers killed while on active duty on guided fishing trips. S.K.I.F.F. trips are funded by donations both given by and collected by the members of the Austin Fly Fishers. The boys’ dad, Sergeant First Class Mat Henderson, is currently deployed at Forward Operating Base “Gary Owen” in Iraq, serving with the 163rd Military Intelligence Battalion.
ETHAN AND LOGAN SHOW THEIR EARLY MORNING CATCHES
ETHAN HOISTS HIS DEEPWATER CHANNEL CAT
Start Time: 6:15a
End Time: 10:45a
Air Temp: 72F at trip’s start.
Water Surface Temp: ~79F
Wind: Winds were stiff from the SSW at around 14 at the start of the trip, slowly creeping up to S at 17 by 10, then leveling off around S 15 after that.
Skies: Skies were fair entire morning.
Because their mom has two younger boys at home, I picked Logan and Ethan up at their doorstep at 5:55a. They’d been up since 5:00a getting ready and were fired up. They asked 1,001 questions on the 20 minute drive to the boat ramp. By 6:15a we were launched and baiting up some bream poles to catch a few sunfish just to break the ice at Area 239. Both boys had been fishing only one time before, and neither had ever caught a fish. Needless to say, they weren’t very familiar with equipment and terminology, so I had to take it slow and teach step-by-step this morning. Before long, we’d tallied 5 sunfish and transitioned over to using a rod and close-faced reel. The boys both picked up on that in 3-4 casts and, despite the heavy wind, we headed out looking for a glimpse of topwater activity.
With the high winds, there was no topwater action to be found, so I showed the boys the basics of downrigging and we capitalized on the suspended, shad-oriented white bass that we saw regularly at 23-28 feet on the E. facing slope between Area 205 and Area 459. We ran a Lunker Licker on one rod and a Pet Spoon on the other and stayed in the fish enjoying moderate action for a full 2 hours, bringing 17 fish over the side including a truly large 16 1/2 inch white bass on the Lunker Licker. This fish will qualify Ethan for the new Stillhouse Catch & Release lake record in the Jr. Angler division.
After continuing to see solid action right at Area 459 on pass after pass, I dropped a buoy hoping, despite the wind, that we could either jig or lift-drop a few fish here just to change up the routine a bit and give the boys a chance to practice their casting. This just didn’t work out well. Logan did get one small drum on a jigged blade bait, but the fish were just too spread out over the bottom to get anything going with 2 novice casters facing the teeth of the wind.
Ethan expressed an interest in catching more sunfish with the bream rod, so, we rigged back up, headed to Area 239 and dabbled with the sunfish for a while, putting 5 more sunfish over the side. The boys got excited about now using our small sunfish as bait to lure larger gamefish, so we tried 2 drifts with downlines and the drift sock out at Area 199 and 457, but scratched at both areas. However, as we approached the end of our drift at Area 457 I began to see consistent suspended white bass showing on sonar. Logan enjoyed the downrigging most of all the techniques we tried and wanted to give it another try before we wrapped up our morning. So, once again we deployed twin ‘riggers with the Pet Spoon and Lunker Licker tied on and worked from Area 457 to Area 458. In the last 15 minutes of our trip we managed two more keeper white bass, and, for a grand finale, a 3.5 pound channel catfish that hit the Lunker Licker as it slowed on the inside of a sharp turn.
We finished up our trip at this point with a short, but wet, ride back to the ramp as we practically surfed our way back in on the now large waves pushed by 17-18 mph winds over open water. A great trip with two great boys!!
TALLY = 31 FISH, all caught and released
Bob Maindelle, Owner, Holding The Line Guide Service and Kids Fish, Too! Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide, Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Lake Georgetown Fishing Guide, Walter E. Long (Decker) Lake Fishing Guide. Offering Salado Fishing, Killeen Fishing and Ft. Hood Fishing