Good Luck!! Break a Wrist (or was that Leg?) — 30 Fish — Belton — 13 June 2011






This morning I fished with a father and sons trio consisting of Royce G. (dad) from the Lubbock area, son Nic G. who works for the University of Georgia, and son Jeff who works as a federal game warden on Fort Hood.

From L to R – Royce, Jeff, and Nic with the last 4 keeper whites we downrigged for on what was a pretty tough day on Belton.


These fellows rented a floating cabin at Cedar Ridge Marina on Belton Lake and booked a morning trip with me to sample Belton’s fishing.

I got out well before sunrise and netted shad for this trip then picked them up at their doorstep. We started the day searching what has been a very productive stretch of water from Area 388 to Area 726 with sonar. We saw abundant bait and gamefish holding down at 25-27 feet over a 40 foot bottom. We got twin downriggers working and were onto fish immediately. We boated 10 fish in less than an hour’s time including white bass and short hybrid. I stayed in this area hoping that as the sun directly shone on this area that the fish would rise to feed on the surface, but, the chop was a bit heavy and this never materialized.

We then headed downlake to sample the live bait situation. We looked over a few stretches of water and actually e-anchored at 3 distinct areas including Areas 682, 815, and 344. Each spot dealt us the same hand — we had abundant strikes on our live shad baits that went ~3″ in length, but for every 1 fish we caught, we lost 2-3 baits to fish that struck and missed or just tail-bit our baits. I suspect very small white bass or hybrid were responsible. We did manage to land 4 short hybrid, 2 blue cat, 1 channel cat, and 1 white bass, but the short strikes were really frustrating. I even tried tail-hooking baits and dropping down several hook sizes, all to no avail.

By around 11:00am we decided to change tactics and return to downrigging so as to cover some water for a few still-active fish as the morning bite wound down. We boated 2 white bass on trolled Pets at between Area 347 and the shore, 3 white bass on trolled Pets at Area 84, then headed out and worked a circuit from Area 709 to Area 437 for an additional 7 white bass, all on downrigged Pets.

Things were a bit tough today, which seems to be the rule on days that begin with the wind blowing before sunrise. As I’ve looked back over our recent warm-weather period, it seems the better bites have been on days where we start off flat calm and then have winds tapering up toward midday versus tougher days where the wind’s been cranked up since before sunrise.

We left the water with 30 fish boated — not a bad day, but Belton has the potential for producing much better in this season.

Despite the so-so fishing, the fellows were discussing the possibility of coming out again the following Thursday. We were rigged and ready when a call came in the night before … it was Nic letting me know that Royce had taken a fall while venturing around Lake Travis and broke his wrist, so, our plans abruptly changed.

I’m looking forward to getting to fish with these fellows again in the fall.

Royce, I hope you get healed up quickly.

TALLY = 30 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’s CONDITIONS:

Start Time: 6:45a

End Time: 1:30p

Air Temp: 78F at trip’s start.

Water Surface Temp: ~83F

Wind: Winds were up at S7 by sunrise increasing to S12-13 by midday.

Skies: Skies were fair and bright








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