This Good Friday was spent on the water with Mr. Tony Vriseno of Belton, and his two sons, 13-year-old Tony and 8-year-old Ben. The boys had the day off from school for the Easter holiday.
Tony Vriseno of Belton did very well this morning throwing bladebaits and jigging slabs and was rewarded for his efforts. These white bass were both just shy of 15″.
Ben Vriseno got a little help from his dad and did really well this morning, too.
Tony works for the Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF) Railroad as a conductor and had some down time in his schedule, so, he gave me a ring a few weeks ago and we put this “Kids Fish, Too!” trip on the calendar. Kids Fish, Too! trips are intended for only the kids to do the fishing whether or not parents/guardians come along for the ride. These are a little less expensive than a standard trip, and tend to go 3-4 hours instead of 4+ hours as most adult trips do.
Radiational cooling took the sunrise temperature down to just 43F this morning, so, we were back to hats and gloves and jackets after wearing Crocs and shorts for a few of last week’s Spring Break trips.
The boys both were already familiar with how to use spinning gear, and so to start our day, I headed up shallow and had them cast bladebaits for white bass. Although the fish were willing, they were nowhere near as shallow as they were last week before last Saturday’s cold front and yesterday’s coldfront pushed them back down in the water column and back away from shore. There was no bait on or near the surface today and no helpful bird action to key on.
We found our first batch of fish in 15-17 feet of water, backed off a good cast’s length and worked them over with bladebaits. We picked up 25 fish in our first 65 minutes on the water before this shallow bite died.
From that point on, it was all vertical jigging in 35 to 42 feet of water. Tony got the hang of this tactic pretty quickly and fished in the stern pretty much independently. Ben was aided by his dad at the beginning and then he, too, was catching fish on his own by the end of the trip.
We made 3 distinct stops in deep water and found fish at 2 of them, allowing us to boat another 53 fish spread over the last 3 hours on the water.
Tony (dad) and I laughed at how the boys were getting to the age where if dad says something, it goes in one ear and out the other, yet let a coach or, in today’s case, a fishing guide, say the exact same thing, and all of the sudden it’s like Gospel.
We had a good time this morning! Of the 78 fish we landed, 3 were largemouth bass, and the remainder were white bass in the 1-3 year class range.
TALLY = 78 FISH, all caught and released
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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:
Start Time: 7:30a
End Time: 11:45a
Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 43F
Water Surface Temp: 64.6F
Wind Speed & Direction: Winds light and variable until 10:30am when they went SSE9.
Sky Conditions: Clear blue skies thanks to post-frontal high pressure
Water Level: 624.57 and falling with 622.0 being full pool. Water being released at 1139 cubic feet per second. Lake fell 0.13 feet in the past 24 hours
Other: GT= 0
Wx SNAPSHOT (a graphical look at the forecast that faced us today):
AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:
Bob Maindelle
Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service
254.368.7411 (call or text)
Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com
E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle