This past Saturday morning, April 29th, I finished with Mr. Jim Deuser of Sun City, Texas, his son, Dan, and Dan’s son, 15-year-old Jacob.
15-year-old Jacob Deuser with our longest hybrid of the trip taken on live threadfin shad.
Dan Deuser scored this fish right off the bat this morning.
Jim specialized in mixed bag angling, landing the greatest variety of fish today, including a two smallmouth bass.
The Deusers came out with me once before in November of ‘16 during which time we used a smoking tactic for a mix of white bass and smaller hybrid stripers. During that trip Jim asked what other manner of fishing Belton offered, and I mentioned about the quality hybrid fishing that normally takes place in April and May. He reserved a date that very same day, and today we saw that forecast of quality hybrid striper fishing come true
Thanks to some prefrontal warming we had very windy conditions today with straight-line winds between 17 and 21 mph. The incoming coldfront would shift our winds to the NW at 25mph, drop the ambient temperature quickly, and bring in a bit of rain beginning around 3p, thus forcing a postponement of the evening’s scheduled trip.
We were still able to get on the open water areas that have been productive all week this week, but the heavy wave action definitely did hinder our results a bit. We fished five areas this morning, picking up mostly white bass and a few hybrid at our first stop, then we encountered an are almost exclusively hybrid – based bite at our second stop, our third stop produced hybrid, two smallmouth, two largemouth, and one freshwater drum. Our fourth stop produced a handful of white bass and short hybrid, and we saved a bit of vertical jigging specifically for white bass for the very last.
All told, we landed exactly 50 fish this morning. Having enjoyed the fishing both today and last November, Jim went ahead and requested a date for November ‘17 before we parted ways at the boat dock around 11am today.
TALLY = 50 FISH, all caught and released
TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:
Start Time: 7:15a
End Time: 11:00a
Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 73F
Water Surface Temp: 72.2F
Wind Speed & Direction: S17+
Sky Conditions: 90% grey clouds
Water Level: 1.76 feet above full pool and falling; 2700+ cfs release
GT = 0
Wx SNAPSHOT:
AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:
**Area 1932 – mixed bag on bait
**Area 1933 – all hybrid
**Area 1931 – mixed bag on bait
**Area 1918/1731 – whites and short hybrid
**Area vic 1916 slab for whites
Bob Maindelle
Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service
254.368.7411 (call or text)
Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com
E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com
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