Belton Lake Fishing Report – 26 September 2009 – 74 Fish (AM & PM Trips)






I fished back-to-back trips today, both including children. In the morning, I welcomed Doug F., a surgeon at Scott & White, back aboard. We’d last fished in April of 2008. This time his son, Jacob, at age 6 was now old enough to attend and Doug desired that the trip be focused on Jacob’s success. Then, in the afternoon, I welcomed Mrs. Tori A. and her two daughters, Ashley and Mattie, aboard for our 10th S.K.I.F.F. trip of the year. SKIFF stands for Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun. SKIFF trips are funded by donations both given by and collected by the members of the Austin Fly Fishers. AFF has 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.

Young Jacob F. of Temple and proud papa Doug with Jacob’s biggest fish ever, a solid Belton Hybrid Striped Bass

Tori A., mom of Mattie (blue vest) and Ashley (red vest) holds Mattie’s trophy hybrid, a 7.00 pound monster!

Start Time: 7:00a

End Time: 7:45p

Air Temp: 65F at trip’s start.

Water Surface Temp: ~80-82F

Wind: Winds were very light from the WNW at trip’s start, going light and variable during daylight hours and settling to near calm from the SE by sunset.

Skies: Mostly sunny all day with thin, wispy, high level clouds.


As we pulled away from the dock with Doug and Jacob raring to go, we headed north of Area 84 and did a quick sonar sweep which revealed little. We then headed to search the bottom between Areas 487 and 488. Here, we found some scattered bait (small shad) in the lower 1/3 of the water column just starting to get active, and some gamefish holding tight to the bottom in and around this bait. Our first fish of the day came about 20 minutes into the trip just as our presentation worked into a congregation of bottom-hugging white bass. Jacob did a great job of fighting the fish, not reeling too fast or too slow and keeping his rod up at a 45 degree angle instead of “pumping” it as so many kids see done “on TV”. He went on to land that fish, then a nice 3.25 pound hybrid, then a short hybrid, and two other white bass before that method of fishing no longer held his attention. He was taken with the prospect of catching sunfish by another means, and so we changed gears and went in pursuit of the mighty bluegill. We fished two areas, Area 492 and 499, and put a combined total of 25 sunfish in the boat, including bluegill and one longear sunfish. Jacob’s bluegill fishing near shore was punctuated with a few transfers into and out of the boat to explore the terrain, eat smoked almonds, and get hands and feet dirty in nature … good boy stuff!! Jacob then requested that we give the “big fish” a try again, so, we spot-hopped hoping to catch a few still-active fish, but, but this time the morning bite was over (no wind, bright sun, no bait, no topwater, no birds, boats packing up and leaving, etc.) and so by around 11am we decided to call it a day. All in all Jacob did great. He and his dad put exactly 30 fish in the boat, and Jacob’s hybrid striper photo is certainly “frame-worthy”!

After Doug and Jacob headed out, I had some downtime until my 3:45pm meeting time with Tori and her girls. Although the conditions were forbidding, I did some fishing and a lot of sonar searching for bait during this time. I had success at between Areas 521 and 522 by downrigging with Pets in 40 to 42 feet of water, pulling 5 whites of various sizes and 2 just legal largemouth on downriggers, and catching one suspended largemouth that went 15.5″ on a bladebait along the same troll path these other fish came out of. I also caught 3 short whites on the ‘riggers between Areas 437 and 171. That was some pretty slow fishing from ~11am to 3pm — just 11 fish in 4 hours — but typical of mid-day on a windless Belton.

At ~3p I headed back to the dock to eat a bite and get ready for the trip for Tori and her girls. I planned to put the girls on sunfish early, then bet on a solid pre-sunset to post-sunset white bass/hybrid bite for the evening. As we headed out, we returned to Area 492 for some sunfish fishing based on the good success we’d had there this morning. We made a couple of short hops along this stretch and boated 4-6 fish on each hop on our bream rods baited with worm. Within 90 minutes we’d boated 20 fish (19 bluegill and 1 green sunfish) and the girls were excited at the prospect of catching some larger fish of a different species. We had a bit of a dry spell until around 6pm, picking only one small white up at Area 307 over about 45 minutes, then things started to ramp up for us. We first encountered deep, bottom-hugging fish at just south of Area 488, and slowly made our way to Area 84. Once we hit the 30 foot contour and shallower, things really started to happen. Schools of bait, white bass, and hybrid began to appear regularly on sonar at ~27 feet with occasional “early risers” found up at 22 feet. As the light faded the fish moved shallower and higher in the water column between Area 84 and 302. Over the final hour and 45 minutes of the trip we boated 13 fish including the biggest of the day, a 7.00 pound hybrid as well as 3 other keeper hybrid and 1 short hybrid. We also put a nice 4.25 pound largemouth in the boat. This fish measured only 18″ but was very thick and “stocky”. The balance of the catch over this time frame consisted of keeper white bass, all right at +/- 11.5 inches. We saw 4 briefly appearing, small schools of whites come up and feed near the top literally for just seconds at a time. By 7:45 things were just about done. We neaten up the boat and headed on in. As we came downlake we passed Temple Lake Park expecting to see some boats out there but there was none. Things seem unusually quiet at Temple Lake Park this season, and on topwater in general. Perhaps a few days of steady weather will help turn things around.

Today’s total was 30 fish in the morning trip with Doug and Jacob, 11 fish in the interim time between trips, and 33 fish during the evening trip with Tori, Ashley, and Mattie.


TALLY = 74 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








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