This past Tuesday morning, March 21st, I fished Belton Lake with Rick and Sharon Powell and their friend, Ricardo Cisneros.
Mrs. Sharon Powell took this hybrid striper on live bait from 28 feet of water over a deeper bottom. Each area we fished gave up a few hybrid initially, but then white bass invaded and beat all other species to the bait.
Ricardo Cisneros took this 8.5 pound blue catfish on a large, lively threadfin shad before the white bass took over.
Prior to the trip I explained what I felt our options would be. This included fishing artificials for white bass and\or fishing with live shad primarily for hybrid striper, knowing that whenever live shad are used, other species are sure to be caught, as well. Rick’s only guidance to me was to make sure that Sharon caught fish.
Given the clear, bright conditions that developed right at sunrise, I thought our best shot at hybrid striper would come early. We fished a number of areas that initially marked up with hybrid on sonar, and, indeed, produced a few hybrid striper, but at each location, white bass would move in soon after a few fish were caught.
While there is certainly nothing wrong with catching white bass, doing it on heavier tackle intended for hybrid mutes their fight a good bit. So, in our third hour on the water and after the hybrid seem to have run their course for the morning, we changed over to deep vertical jigging with lightweight slabs equipped with Hazy Eye Stinger Hooks to put a good number of white bass in the boat. While fishing in 40 to 42 feet of water, we took our tally from 20 fish taken in the first two hours up to 62 fish by the end of our third hour.
Given the ample quantity of large livebaits I had, I offered that we would spend the last part of our trip hanging large, live baits in a final attempt to put a few more hybrid in the boat.
Although Ricardo managed one more hybrid, everything else we caught, even on these large livebaits, were white bass. We closed out our trip this morning with 76 fish including our largest, an 8.5 pound blue cat, which came up and slammed one of Ricardo’s large threadfin shad between our first and second hour on the water
To me, fishing is always enjoyable, but it is so much more enjoyable when doing it with good people – – and that was certainly the case in fishing with the Powell’s and Ricardo today. After the trip we enjoyed a nice lunch together at Sol de Jalisco right there in Morgan’s Point.
TALLY = 76 FISH, all caught and released
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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:
Start Time: 7:45a
End Time: 1:00p
Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 62F
Water Surface Temp: 65.9F
Wind Speed & Direction: SSE13 at sunrise, increasing to SSE19 by trip’s end
Sky Conditions: Cloudless, fair skies and bright conditions all morning
Water Level: 0.66 feet above full pool
GT = 95
AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:
Bob Maindelle
Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service
254.368.7411 (call or text)
Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com
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