Sonar School Graduates 2 More! 20 Jan. 2015

I conducted two “Sonar Sessions” yesterday on Belton Lake.  My morning session was spent with Mr. Brad Hall and my evening session was spent with Mr. Ronnie Mathis.

A “Sonar Session” is a 3-hour, on the water block of instruction that I offer to those who own modern Lowrance and Humminbird sonar units.  The Sonar Session is intended to do several things: 1) ensure that all transducers and wiring is proper installed, 2) ensure that all units have settings appropriate for our deep, clear, rocky Texas Hill Country lakes, and 3) use the units in real-life fishing scenarios in order to make sure basic functions are understood and to introduce advanced functions.  I ask $90 for such 3 hour sessions.  I typically conduct these on Belton Lake or Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir, and ride along in the student’s boat using their sonar.

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Brad Hall shows his “diploma” from Sonar School this morning.

Brad and Ronnie are tournament fishing partners and co-workers at McLane’s in Temple.  As they met up at the 2015 Central Texas Boat and Outdoor Show for a pre-tournament captains’ meeting, they sat in on my seminar, the topic of which was selecting, using, and interpreting sonar.  They agreed they would be well-served by on on-the-water session.

Brad had a Lowrance HDS-7 Gen 2 on his console with the transducers (1 for colored sonar and 1 for StructureScan) mounted on his transom, and a Lowrance Elite 5 DSI on his bow-mounted trolling motor.  The most valuable lessons learned today for Brad were the use of the down-looking mode of StructureScan, and how the thin-sheet sound array emitted by the Elite 5 DSI was reducing his chances of seeing his bait and fish when fishing vertically.  A much more appropriate unit for the bow is a traditional colored sonar unit with a standard transducer that emits sound in a 3-dimensional cone shape.  As you can see above, Brad was able to connect all the dots and, ultimately, connect with fish for his “final exam” (vicinity Area 1353).

In the afternoon, I met up with Ronnie Mathis and his son, 4-year-old “Little Ronnie”.  Ronnie’s bass boat is equipped with a Lowrance HDS-9 Gen 2 Touch with both transducers on his jack plate.  On the bow he has a Lowrance Elite 5 HDI.  Ronnie was already very familiar with the basic fishing features of his HDS-9, so, we focused on some other areas, including the use of trails vs. routes, sonar logging, side-imaging interpretation, sonar frequency selection, and fish identification in a number of scenarios.  Ronnie also had his unit in “auto” mode for a number of features (sensitivity, depth, colorline) so we switched these over to manual to lock them in.

Towards the end of our trip, as we motored slowly with our noses in the sonar screen, we approached a fairly well-defined creek channel with a bit of timber on the breakline from the old bank down into the channel.  The screen began to get “busy” as we saw shad and a few suspended fish up in the trees.  As we combed over the area more closely, we identified very distinct markings showing schooled white bass and hybrid striped bass among the limbs and bait.  We put the boat into a hover as I worked the trolling motor from the front as Ronnie tracked his lure and the fish using a side-by-side comparison of sonar/down-looking StructureScan in split screen mode.  We boated a number of white bass and hybrid stripers as we precisely worked our slabs slowly through these fish suspended at 30-40 feet over a 50 foot bottom.  As icing on the cake, Little Ronnie landed his personal best from out of this school of fish, boating a nice 4+ pound hybrid striper on his slab fished on a closed-face outfit (vicinity Area 1519).

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Little Ronnie landed his personal best fish tonight as dad learned to get the most out of his sonar units.

If you own a sonar unit but feel you are not getting the most out of it, I would be glad to help.  Just give me a call and we’ll set up a mutually agreeable date to make it happen.

GUIDE’S WEBSITE: http://holdingthelineguideservice.com/

 

Bob Maindelle
Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide
Belton Lake Fishing Guide
Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service
254.368.7411 (call or text)

 

 

First Trip for SKIFF 2015 – Stillhouse Hollow – 3 Fish, 19 Jan. 2015

This afternoon, January 19th, I fished with Aiden Guyer and his mom, Danielle Guyer, of Killeen, TX.  This was the very first SKIFF trip of the 2015 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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Aiden Guyer and his mom, Danielle, attended the first SKIFF outing of 2015.  Cold water and calm conditions limited our catch, but the 70+ degree, sunny day was a nice break from the cold, gray days of late.

Aiden is a 7-year-old first grade student, and the son of U.S. Army Chief Warrant Officer 3 (CW3) Keegan Guyer and his wife, Danielle Guyer.  CW3 Guyer is now serving on his 4th deployment as a military intelligence officer.  He previously served 2 tours in Iraq and 1 tour in Afghanistan.  He is currently back in Afghanistan.  Keegan and Danielle also have a 4 year old son whom Danielle arranged a babysitter for so she and Aiden could have some one-on-one time together in the outdoors.

Our local school district had this Monday off for the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, so, when Danielle contacted me by email on Sunday, I took a quick look at the weather forecast, saw we were to reach 70+ degrees, and went ahead and offered to conduct a trip on short-notice, knowing there would be few such nice days occurring for quite a while.

Fishing was very slow today, as if often can be on days that are “nice” for humans.  Although it was warm and balmy, it was also very clear, very bright, and very calm.  We worked hard and traveled far looking at and fishing a lot of water to put just 3 fish in the boat today.  Given Aiden’s age, I was a bit concerned about the vertical jigging I normally do this time of year being too technical for him, but, on the occasions when vertical jigging was useful, he did just fine.  We just had a hard time finding fishable populations of fish in the 48F water we encountered.

When all was said and done, Aiden landed 2 very nice white bass, both taken in 24-26 feet of water near bottom on Pet Spoons fished behind downrigger balls going <2mph.  He also landed 1 crappie that fell for a vertically jigged slab in ~30 feet of water just before sunset, so it was nice to end on a positive note.

 

TALLY = 3 FISH, all caught and released

 

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 1:30p

End Time:  5:30p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start:  70F

Water Surface Temp:  48F

Wind Speed & Direction:  Light at S2-3

Sky Conditions:  Clear with some thin white cover moving in over the last half of the trip

Other: GT=0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1309/1518 – downrigging for 2 white bass

**Area  340 vertical jigging for 1 crappie

 

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com