SKIFF Record Broken Today! — 153 FISH!!! Belton Lake, 26 June 2014

This morning I ran the 8th SKIFF trip of the 2014 season.  Joining me were 12-year-old Cody McNeal and 10-year-old Cady McNeal.   SKIFF (Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun) trips are provided free of charge to families whose children are separated from a parent due to that parent’s military service thanks to the Austin Fly Fishers and a network of supportive individuals from all over the U.S.  All it takes is a phone call from a parent to me at 254-368-7411 to reserve a date.

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Although the majority of our catch taken on topwater consisted of smaller, “schoolie”-sized fish, Cody pulled this nice hybrid from beneath the melee on the surface using a large live bait.

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Cady got this nice hybrid just moments after her brother’s fish took one of the live baits we were fishing down at 23′ over a 40′ bottom.

Cody and Cady’s stepdad, Staff Sergeant Lee Igo, has been away for over a month at an Army school in Fort Bliss, Texas (in El Paso) fulfilling requirements that will allow him to advance to Sergeant First Class.  The kids’ mom, Denise Igo, has been a huge help to the SKIFF program through her very well regarded Facebook page called “Fort Hood Area Events” which has over 24,000 likes.  She regularly reminds the community of the existence and purpose of SKIFF.

Fortunately, Cody and Cady were no fishing rookies.  Both could handle a spinning rod very comfortably and were able to cast with both good distance and good accuracy.  So, when opportunity knocked, they answered.

Based on the success I enjoyed yesterday on Belton Lake with another party, and seeing that today’s conditions were to be nearly identical, I felt we had a good shot at catching fish on topwater early and then downrigging later in the morning in the same areas where topwater action had occurred.

As we got going, no more than 10 minutes into the trip we spotted our first of many large schools of topwater feeding fish despite a fairly heavy chop on the water.  These schools consisted of a mix of white bass and small hybrid striped bass chasing mainly young of the year shad.  These shad are growing out well now that the water temperature is in the 80’s and food is abundant.

Long story short, we stayed on topwater fish and sight-cast to these fish for a solid 3 hours.  By 9:15am we’d boated over 120 fish on a Cork Rig with a shad imitator attached which closely matched forage size.  With about an hour left to go, I offered the kids some options, as I had come prepared to downrig as well as to fish with live baits.  I told them we could continue fishing with topwater and likely have a shot at breaking the long-standing SKIFF record catch of 147 fish set by Chase, Sean, and Trent Salyer on the 29th of January 2011, or, we could do some downrigging and/or live bait fishing for variety’s sake.  I made it clear that these methods would likely not be as productive as the topwater action had been.

The siblings agreed to try to catch one more fish each on topwater, and then to give downrigging a try.  We were pleasantly surprised as we began downrigging with balls set to 12 and 25 feet, that each time a rod went off, we brought in doubles (2 fish at at time)!  So now downrigging was outproducing the topwater bite, and the 147 fish mark looked very attainable.  As our fish count crept into the 130’s, I again offered variety in the form of fishing with live bait for some larger-sized hybrid.  The kids were good with giving that a try, too.

As our baits went down (4 rods), 3 of them got hit and up came with some very nice 3 pound category hybrid stripers.  We were now at around 140 fish.  As we scrambled to rebait our lines, and now sensing the record really could fall, we got our baits set down to the 23 foot mark where sonar showed the hybrid to be.  Just as we got the lines all set, a school of white bass and small hybrid began to feed on the surface, enveloping our boat in the frenzy.  I told the kids to grab the topwater rods and go for the record.  They brought in fish after fish from this cooperative school until my “clicker” read 153 fish at our pre-determined end time of 10:15am.  The record of 147 fish had been broken and replaced by a new record of 153 fish on a 4-hour SKIFF trip!!  Very exciting!

TALLY = 153 FISH, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

 

Start Time: 6:15am

End Time: 10:15am

Air Temp.: 75F @ trip’s start
Water Surface Temp.: 79.8F
Wind: SSE11-13
Skies: 100% bright grey cloud cover
Other Notes: N/A
AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:
**Area  147/1001 topwater action at first light
**Area  509/1356 topwater action for first hour after sunrise
** Areas  1137/687 and 210/689 very aggressive topwater action and suspended fish beneath for last 3 hours of trip
Bob Maindelle

Holding the Line Guide Service
254.368.7411
www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com
Salado, Texas

Bad Day to be a Shad! — 46 Fish, Belton Lake, 25 June 2014

This morning I fished with perennial guests Dr. David Butler and his boys, Jack (age 14) and Jay (age 12).  David is a career dermatologist who got his start as an Army doctor, and now, as a civilian, is once again serving (veteran) soldiers through his work at the Veterans’ Administration hospital system.

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David set the example for the boys by landing the first legal-sized hybrid of our trip.

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12-year-old Jay then landed this nice 3 pound hybrid on a downrigged Pet Spoon.

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And before all was said and done, Jack chipped in with a hybrid of his own.

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On a number of occasions as we brought hooked fish to boatside, they regurgitated the shad they’d eaten.  This gave us a good idea as to the size of bait they were pursuing, and allowed us to match that bait size with our lures.  Here, a white bass regurgitates a recently swallowed shad.
We had a very productive trip on Belton Lake this morning, although it was cut short at the three-hour mark at precisely 9:15a as lightning began to flash just to the south of us, in the vicinity of US Hwy. 190 and Loop 121.
We met at 6:15am, spotted our first topwater feeding fish at 6:25am and stayed on the topwater action (thanks to grey cloud cover and light winds) for nearly 2 hours.  After that we combed back over the areas that held these topwater fish by using the “Trails” function on sonar to identify where these fish had been, and worked them over with downriggers when we (more often than not) found the fish still present, only suspended instead of up on the surface.
In those first two hours we tried to match the hatch the best we could, although the young of the year shad that most of these topwater-feeding fish were eating are quite small.  I found a white/blue Cicada produced best, although was far from perfect.  Despite staying in the fish the entire time, we hooked up on roughly 1 in 8-10 casts.  This ratio will improve as the shad grow out and larger lures look more like the bait (and vice versa).
Our final hour was spent downrigging.  I chose to run small Pet Spoons on an umbrella rig on one ‘rigger and slightly larger Pet Spoons on a tandem rig on the other ‘rigger.  We caught a blend of all sizes of both white bass and hybrid stripers up to 3.25 pounds.
By the time the lightning began to flash, we’d boated exactly 46 fish.  After making a beeline to the boat ramp and getting my party to safety, I studied the weather radar.  It looked like the weather was stacked up all the way down I-35 to Austin and beyond and was moving our way at a pretty good clip.  Thinking we weren’t going to get another window without lightning present, we decided to play it safe and call it a good trip right there.

TALLY = 46 FISH, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

 

Start Time: 6:15am

End Time: 9:15am

Air Temp.: 75F @ trip’s start
Water Surface Temp.: 80.9F
Wind: SSE7
Skies: 100% bright grey cloud cover
Other Notes: N/A
AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:
**Area  1283 to 1271 — topwater for 90 minutes
**Area  1143/1372/1283 – downrigged for 90 minutes after topwater ended
Bob Maindelle

Holding the Line Guide Service
254.368.7411
www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com
Salado, Texas