What’s a Cat-Cracker?? — 17 Fish on Belton, 29 Oct. 2014

On Wednesday morning, 29 Oct. I fished with husband and wife team Mike and Nancy Kelley of Masterson, TX, out near Amarillo.

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(L to R) Mike and Nancy “grip and grin” with a sampling of the white bass we caught on slabs this morning from out of 40+ feet of water.

Of course the Amarillo area is “oil country”.  Mike worked for Conoco for a number of years before leaving that vocation to run a Christian campground.  Nancy has worked for many years for Conoco and is currently working in their solvent sales division.  At one time Mike was employed as a cat-cracker.  That’s oil-speak for someone involved in the process of catalytic cracking used to derive petroleum-based products from it.

As the old line from “Get Smart” goes, we “missed it by that much.”  “It” was the timing on the passage of our third autumn cold front.  As dry fronts like this one pass, fishing is typically best as the wind velocity rises to a peak.  Fishing then declines after that peak velocity is reached and begins to drop off.  Unfortunately for us, that rising wind speed took place in the overnight hours and, by safe light had already begun to taper off, leaving us with a tough row to hoe.

We found plenty of fish, but getting them to strike was an entirely different story.  We encountered fish at four distinct areas but found two of these populations totally turned off (1463/1383 and 1388/1209), and the other two with just reluctant fish.

We started off at both areas with a vertical jigging tactic  to bring the fish in to just beneath the boat and to get that competitive nature working in our favor.  This yielded 9 fish at the first area and 3 at the second.  Once the initial interest waned, we threw a wider net by using downriggers to cover a bit more water in the same vicinity to add a few more fish to the count.

In one area (Area 1388/1209), right over the Leon River channel, I encountered “sonar screen-fulls” of fish which I suspect were smaller white bass. Both a friend of mine and I worked downriggers through these fish extensively without result — he actually stayed on these fish all morning exclusively (~5 hours) and only came up with 4 fish for the effort — more evidence of how turned off these fish really were.  It was interesting to note that the first 2 fish he landed came within 5 minutes of the first of the nine fish we landed at the first location we experienced limited success at.  The areas we were fishing at this time were over a mile apart.

We never saw any birds working or any fish schooling, and never caught the scent of shad on the water’s surface nor saw any bait slicks.  Things were just very, very slow this morning.  For our efforts we landed 1 largemouth bass, 1 blue catfish, 4 short hybrid striped bass, and 11 white bass — and this was after extending the trip by an extra hour.

 

TALLY = 17 FISH, all caught and released

 

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:15a

End Time:  12:40p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start:  64F

Water Surface Temp:  73.6F

Wind Speed & Direction:  NNW13 tapering down to NNW6

Sky Conditions: 70% grey clouds over a fair blue sky

Other: GT=0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area  717

**Area 512/1023/678

 

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Turnover = Tough — 33 Fish for the Sward Brothers, 19 Oct. 2014

During the afternoon of Saturday, 18 Oct. I fished with brothers David and Robert Sward as a birthday celebration.

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(L to R) Brothers David and Robert Sward hung tough with me through a slow 3 hours to enjoy a solid 1-hour twilight bite tonight as we faced both turnover and low-wind conditions.

David is a U.S. Navy Vietnam-era veteran from Austin, TX, where he retired from the Veterans’ Administration, and Robert traveled in from Arizona for a few days’ visit with his brother.

We had a number of things working against us this evening, chief among them the annual occurrence of “turnover”.  Turnover happens when cool autumn weather and shorter days chill the warm, upper layer of water and causes it to sink down into the cooler, lower layer of water. When these previously separated layers of water mix, the temperature becomes uniform from top to bottom and the entire water column gets oxygenated sufficiently to support life. Fish can be found at all depths and are typically very scattered.  Aside from this, we also had very light east winds — as the old saying goes, “Winds from the east, fish bite least.”

We just picked and pecked for our first 3 hours on the water picking up just 4 fish and missing a fifth as a largemouth bass hit David’s bladebait and then jumped and threw it.  I saw fish and bait scattered everywhere down to as much as 58 feet, but finding concentrations of fish and/or fish that were willing to bite was just hard tonight.

Finally, around 6:00p, I began to notice (on the nearly flat-calm surface) schools of small shad, about 1.25 inches in length, working over the surface at the lower end of the lake.  Oftentimes the conditions that allow for this activity also allow for gamefish to go on the prowl.  As I began to slowly idle in and around these pods of baitfish, I began to pick up sonar returns of coalescing schools of white bass beginning to feed.  We got our 3-armed umbrella rigs down among these fish at ~43 feet over a 50 to 80 foot bottom.  The action continued to build to a peak over the next 45 minutes during which we took singles, doubles, and triples on the spoons used on the umbrella rigs.  Around 6:45p, we encountered a large shoal of fish numbering around 300-400 individuals.  I e-anchored the boat over these fish and we dropped 3/4 oz. TNT slabs down below them and worked them through the fish, quickly putting 16 fish in the boat in under 10 minutes until the school disbanded.  We boated a total of 29 fish in our last hour during this twilight feed.

The feed ended right at sunset.  For our efforts tonight we boated 33 white bass.

TALLY = 33 FISH, all caught and released

 

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:00p

End Time:  7:15p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start:  82.3F

Water Surface Temp:  76.8F

Wind Speed & Direction:  E3-5

Sky Conditions: 50% cloud cover on a fair, blue sky

Other: GT=0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area  1458 to 1460 to 1458 produced 29 of our 33 fish this evening.

 

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Turnover Makes it Tough — SKIFF Trip #26, Stillhouse, 25 Fish

This past Saturday morning, Oct. 18th, I fished with Joshua and Kennedy Vassar of Killeen, TX.  This was the 26th SKIFF trip of the 2014 season.  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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L to R: Kennedy and Joshua Vassar worked through some tough “turnover” conditions with me to land 25 fish this morning.

15-year-old Joshua and his sister, 7-year-old Kennedy, are the youngest two of five children of U.S. Army Sergeant First Class and Mrs. Dameon Vassar of Killeen, Texas.  SFC Vassar is currently serving a nine month deployment to Afghanistan where he serves as a “Commo NCO” installing, upgrading, and repairing radios and other communications equipment.  This is SFC Vassar’s fifth deployment.

Turnover has finally occurred and, as it normally is during this time, the fishing was tough with bait and gamefish scattered from 0 to 55 feet and everywhere in between. Turnover is an annual event that occurs when cool autumn weather chills the warm, upper layer of water and causes it to sink down into the cooler, lower layer of water.  When these previously separated layers of water mix, the temperature becomes uniform from top to bottom and the entire water column gets oxygenated sufficiently to support life.  Fish can be and are, literally, everywhere and are scattered about.

Our best success came in two distinct periods. First we caught fish right after sunrise by downrigging for suspended white bass that were schooled up and chasing shad from 25 feet deep up to the surface in over 40 feet of water. During this short feed, Kennedy landed the first fish of her life, a 10.25 inch white bass, thus qualifying her for a TPWD First Fish Award.

Our second bit of success came in the last hour of the day when the cloud cover that persisted all morning finally cleared and a bit of wind began to blow. At this time we found moderately aggressive white bass loosely congregated in the gut of a channel in 45 to 50 feet deep. Once again, downrigging with three armed umbrella rigs did the trick. Despite e-anchoring and fishing through these loosely scattered fish vertically with slabs, our presentations were ignored — probably because the fish were not very densely schooled and therefore were not truly competing with one another.

We finished up the day with 25 fish including 21 white bass, 1 largemouth bass, and 3 longear sunfish.  These sunfish were caught at the boat ramp just because little Miss Kennedy spotted them and took a liking to them, thus opening the opportunity to quickly introduce her to a new technique and make her instantly successful at it. When the children’s mother, Lovette, arrived I asked her if she enjoyed her downtime.  She said she did indeed enjoy it and spent it doing a little shopping with no kids attached at our local Lowe’s home improvement store.

 

TALLY = 25 FISH, all caught and released

 

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:15a

End Time:  11:30a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start:  64F

Water Surface Temp:  74.7 to 75.8F

Wind Speed & Direction:  ESE2-4

Sky Conditions:  Greyed over but bright until 10am, then clearing to 50% cloudy on a fair blue sky

Other: GT=0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1246/1449 downrigging at 25 feet over 40-42 feet of water

**Area  1464 downrigging at 41 feet over a 44 foot bottom

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Fishin’ with D.J. & Jordann – 63 Fish, Stillhouse, 11 Oct. 2014

This evening I fished with 14-year-old D.J. Burfischer and 5-year-old Jordann Simmons, accompanied by Mrs. Ann Burfischer (D.J.’s mom and Jordann’s grandmother), all of Waco, TX.  This all began with a simple e-mail from Ann to me back on September 23rd after she found me by doing an internet search and saw that I work a lot with kids and family groups.

 

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L to R: D.J. and Jordann with a sampling of the 63 fish we caught as an autumn cold front pushed through.

We had some crazy weather today with 1.2 inches of rain falling between 2am and 11am with the arrival of a cold front.  Once the turbulent weather passed, the rain ended, and the heavy grey clouds began to lighten up, things were just right for a bite to turn on, and, fortunately we were able to work the timing on this trip to take advantage of this window of opportunity.

We were less than 4 minutes out of the No Wake zone when we got onto our first fish of the trip.  We encountered a large school of white bass in 38 feet of water orienting to the bottom.  We started off working slabs through these fish, then “mopped up” with bladebaits, landing a total of 16 fish in our first 30 minutes of fishing.

The thermocline is breaking down and as it does, deeper and deeper waters become oxygenated that have been off limits to fish all summer.  After a summer consisting of 80%+ percent of each trip spent downrigging, today, downrigging was but a fraction of our program, and then only in the waning moments of daylight for fish coming up off bottom to take advantage of the remaining light up shallow.

We spent our entire trip today hopping around a 3 main locations, 2 of which I had scouted earlier in the week.  Each location was 36-44 feet deep, each with large concentrations of bottom-oriented white bass, and each giving up fish to a slab and bladebait tactics.

Young Jordann had never caught a fish before, so, he earned his First Fish Award this evening!

We wound up with exactly 63 fish, every last one of which was a white bass.  Fish from the 1, 2, 3, and 4 year classes were present in our catch.

TALLY = 63 FISH, all caught and released

 

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:20p

End Time:  7:30p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start:  62F

Water Surface Temp:  77.4F

Wind Speed & Direction:  NNW12, tapering to NNW9

Sky Conditions:  Fully greyed over but thinning and lightening

Other: GT=15

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area  914 – smoking 3/4 oz. TNT’s and working blades

**Area  – 1459 – smoking 3/4 oz. TNT’s and working blades

**Area  – 1006 – 1451 – smoking 3/4 oz. TNT’s and working blades

**Area 1458 – 1460 downrigging for a final triple, double, and single — 6 fish in the last 10 minutes of light

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

A Break from the Grind — 38 Fish, SKIFF Trip #25 of 2014

This Friday afternoon I fished a SKIFF trip with the Edwards family of Copperas Cove, TX.  This was the 25th SKIFF trip of the 2014 season.  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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L to R: Kayden, Kody, & Joseph Edwards took some downtime together while wife and mom, SPC Jessica Edwards, is serving in Kuwait.

I received a call this past Tuesday from Kody Edwards.  He told me he’d read a re-post of a SKIFF fishing trip summary someone had placed on Facebook and was interested in scheduling a trip.  After comparing calendars, this afternoon worked best for us both.

Kody is acting as a single dad for a 9-month span while his wife, U.S. Army Specialist Jessica Edwards, serves in Kuwait as a combat medic.  This is Jessica’s first enlistment and her first deployment.  The Edwards’ have two children: 8-year-old Joseph, and 6-year-old Kayden.

I asked Kody, who is himself a U.S. Army veteran having served as an enlisted man in an armor unit, what the toughest part of single parenting was.  He said you don’t appreciate how much slack your spouse picks up until she’s not there to pick it up any longer, and specifically pointed out that her role in caring for the children was the toughest role for him to try to fit into.

The fish cooperated for us well today.  We hit 3 distinct areas and found willing fish biting at all three of them.  The first two areas we hit fished very similarly in that we downrigged deep (thanks to a dissipating thermocline) at 36-41 feet for fish that were several feet deeper than we had the downrigger balls set for.  We then found concentrated fish as we downrigged and stopped to work slabs and bladebaits vertically for these fish.  By the time we got to our last area, the sun had already set and the fish were beginning to turn off, but we put another half-dozen in the boat here before calling it a day.

Just before I throttled up to head to fish our last area of the evening, Kody thanked me for the opportunity to take the trip and mentioned how nice it was to have a break from the grind of the daily routine.

We caught a grand total of 38 white bass.

 

TALLY = 38 FISH, all caught and released

 

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:45p

End Time:  7:30p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start:  85F

Water Surface Temp:  79.6F

Wind Speed & Direction:  S14 tapering to S9

Sky Conditions:  60% clouds on a fair sky

Other: GT=0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area  1450 gave up fish on the downrigger as we searched, then via smoking after we zero’ed in on a concentration in 42′

**Area  1448 gave up fish on the downrigger which were suspended at 37-40 feet over a deeper bottom.  We found schooled fish in sufficient quantities to smoke for them in 36′

**Area  1444 through 1458 gave up twilight fish on the downrigger only, off the face of the slope with balls set at 37′.

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Did a Little Scouting, Took a Little Video – 56 Fish, Stillhouse, 09 Oct. 2014

With 4 trips on the books over the course of the Columbus Day weekend, I wanted to get out on the water and find several concentrations of fish.  The significant cold from that came in this past Saturday has set the water temperatures into the 70’s for keeps now, so, the thermocline will begin to drop and dissipate soon.  Staying on top of fish movements during this time can be tricky.

In addition to finding fish today, I also tested the new Aqua Vu MIcro AV5 with DVR.  Although I took some pretty amateurish video, this was definitely a “work out the bugs” run, but, bottom line: I found and verified fish and species type with this tool, and did it in over 40 feet of water using the infrared lights built into the camera.

When all was said and done today, I spent 5 hours on the water and found 3 distinct populations of fish.  The thermocline has definitely dropped to between 45 and 50 feet, and the fish I caught this morning all came out of 36-44 feet of water and were bottom oriented.  I did not use downriggers at all today as I searched, but rather relied on slabs and bladebaits to probe.

I boated 52 white bass, 3 freshwater drum, and 1 largemouth bass.

TALLY = 56 FISH, all caught and released

 

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:35a

End Time:  12:30p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start:  74F

Water Surface Temp:  77.9F in lower lake, 78.7 at mid lake

Wind Speed & Direction:  SSW 11-13

Sky Conditions:  50% clouds on a fair sky

Other: GT=0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1451 – 20 fish (1 largemouth, 3 drum, 16 white bass)

**Area  1452/1453/1454 – 30 white bass

**Area  1455/1456/1457 – 6 white bass (verified fish presence and left them alone)

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

New Yogurt-based Fish Attractant?! – 43 Fish, Stillhouse, 04 Oct. 2014

This morning I fished with Sophia and Andrew L. of Killeen.  Neither had ever caught a fish before, so, we had our work cut out for us!

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Andrew and Sophia both earned their “First Fish Awards” this cool October morning by landing the first fish of their lives!

Sophia was quite cautious about the whole boat concept and tensed up a bit as the boat listed a bit to one side as her brother shifted his weight.  I assured her this was normal and she seemed to be okay with that.

We headed out of the “No Wake” zone and over to an area I wanted to check with sonar.  We found little there, but I began to describe to the two of them how things would come together once we found some fish on the electronics.  Sophia informed me that, “Fish are very slimy and disgusting creatures, and if I ever wind up catching one I’ll most likely head for the hills!”   Wow!  Maybe my work wasn’t cut out for me after all.

At the second area we surveyed with sonar, I found what we were after — baitfish and gamefish all mixed together in the lower third of the water column.  I gave the kids each tasks that contributed to our success, slowly at first, then, as they mastered those tasks, added more tasks until they were fishing fairly independently.

Sophia’s rod went off first and she came up with a double — two white bass caught at the same time on her umbrella rig.  Low and behold, she did NOT head for the hills, but was now ready to catch another!  Andrew followed in short order with a single white bass, and so it went with the kids catching singles, doubles, and even three triples.  Both kids now had landed the first fish of their lives and, in so doing, earned a Texas Parks and WIldlife Dept. “First Fish Award”. We wound up with 18 fish in the first hour and 30 fish in the first 90 minutes.  The morning’s action was definitely front-loaded, as the action began to drop off around 9:15am and was all but done by 10am.  We fished until around 11:15, picking up only a handful of fish in the last hour.

One funny thing happened as we were cruising from one area to another.  Sophia’s mom had packed her a “Go-Gurt” which is like a soft squeeze-tube filled with yogurt, intended to be convenient and packable.  When the “Go-Gurt” was consumed, the empty pouch, resembling an icicle pouch, was flat and ribbon-like.  Sophia discovered that when this pouch was held by one end up over her head as we went about 35 mph, the pouch would flap and pop like a flag.  Unfortunately, as the kids were seated in front of me and Sophia flew the Go-Gurt flag, the opened end was the end flapping in the breeze.  Well, not exactly all of the Go-Gurt was actually out of the pouch, so, when these thick, opaque “raindrops” began splattering up my polarized glasses, I quickly realized what was going on and ordered the Go-Gurt flag lowered to half-mast.

We downrigged 80% of the time, with occasional short breaks used to work slabs through fish we found heavily schooled on the bottom.

We caught a grand total of 43 fish, including 1 largemouth bass, 1 freshwater drum, and 41 white bass.

 

TALLY = 43 FISH, all caught and released

 

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:30a

End Time:  11:30a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start:  58F

Water Surface Temp:  78.4F

Wind Speed & Direction:  NE12 tapering to ENE8

Sky Conditions:  Cloudless, clear “bluebird” skies

Other: GT=0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1246-1449 was active for the first 45 minutes of the trip

**Area 1450 lit up for about 45 minutes after Area 1246 got quiet

**Area 1259/1412 gave up a few towards trip’s end

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Pre-Frontal Feeding Spree – 43 Fish, SKIFF Trip #23 of 2014

This afternoon I fished a SKIFF trip with Matthew Schaefer of West Fort Hood, TX.  This was the 23rd SKIFF trip of the 2014 season.  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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Matthew landed 43 fish this evening, including his first fish ever, and fish of 3 different species as the fish went on a feeding spree in advance of an early-autumn cold front’s arrival.

8-year-old Matthew is the son of U.S. Army Sergeant Mark Schaefer and his wife, Amy.  Mark is currently in the midst of a 9 month deployment to Afghanistan — his 3rd deployment.  Mark serves as an electronic device repairman.  Amy has two daughters as well, one older than Matthew, and one younger.

Matthew made a wonderful “first impression”.  He waved “hi” to me from the parking lot, so, I knew he was both excited and outgoing.  Before we shoved off, he hugged his mom (without prompting!) and he kissed his little sister, Anna, (again, without prompting).  Later, when he dug out his bag of a half-dozen giant chocolate-chunk cookies from Chick-fil-A, he offered me one before he dug into the bag for his own.  Of course, like most 8-year-olds, he asked 1,001 questions, but that is part of the experience.

Matt had been fishing once before at a Lake Belton fishing derby, but came up empty-handed, so, today when his downrigger rod went off less than 10 minutes after we launched, he felt the tug of something on the end of his line for the first time.  Suffice it to say that not only was the fish hooked!  Matt reeled in a small white bass — his first fish ever — and in so doing earned a TPWD First Fish Award.  Matt was a fast learner.  In no time he was capably using my baitcaster reels with linecounters, paying out the right amount of line behind the boat, then, once I clipped the lines into the downrigger releases, he hit the right buttons on the downriggers’ keypads to send the downrigger balls down to the correct depth.

We fished for both bottom-oriented fish and suspended fish today using 3-armed umbrella rigs equipped with Pet Spoons down around 27-33 feet.  As an early-fall cold front made its way into central Texas, we enjoyed some really aggressive pre-frontal feeding activity.  Largemouth bass were topwater feeding on shad for the first 3 hours of the trip nearly continuously (although difficult to spot in the heavy chop caused by the 13-14 mph winds).

As an illustration of just how aggressive these fish were feeding, Matthew successfully boated 6 triples (a “triple”is when 3 fish are landed at the same time, with one fish caught on each of the 3 lures affixed to the 3-arm umbrella rigs we were using) and 2 doubles.  That is the greatest number of triples I’ve had come over the side of the boat in the several years I’ve been using 3-armed umbrella rigs.

Around 7:00pm, as the cold front edged ever closer, I kept checking the weather radar on my i-Phone, and, by this time the lead edge of an approaching thunderstorm was right at the western edge of Fort Hood.  We played it safe and, with 43 fish now boated, called it a good day about 30 minutes early and headed back in.

We caught a grand total of 43 fish, including 1 largemouth bass, 1 freshwater drum, and 41 white bass.

 

TALLY = 43 FISH, all caught and released

 

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:45p

End Time:  7:15p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start:  88F

Water Surface Temp:  81.7F

Wind Speed & Direction:  SSW14, slowing and shifting to SW12

Sky Conditions:  60% cloudy

Other: GT=0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area  1246 was active for the first half of the trip, then migrated south to…

**Area  862, just south of Area 1246, which lit up the second half of the trip

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com