This morning, Monday, July 17th, I fished a multi-species trip on Stillhouse with Ray Harmon and his adult son, Clinton.

 

Ray and Clinton hooked up with this pair of schooling largemouth on topwater just seconds apart, affording us an opportunity for a father and son photo without holding the fish in the livewell unnecessarily.  The largemouth we landed this morning were all plump with bellies full of small threadfin shad.

Ray is a pilot with McLane Aviation in Temple, TX, operating the corporation’s new Bombardier jet aircraft, and Clinton works for Baylor Medical up in Dallas doing medical research.

There is an old saying in fishing… “Don’t leave fish to find fish.”  I try to abide by that and, in doing so, encouraged Ray to consider fishing Stillhouse with me versus his initial choice of Lake Belton.  Belton can certainly produce some good catches in the summer, but is notoriously tough on calm days, which is what our forecast called for.  This, coupled with the fact that Stillhouse has been producing very consistently for six weeks now, made me very hesitant to leave.

We got going at 6:25a, did a bit of downrigging with spotty results, and then got on fish just as they were becoming active on topwater right at 7:00a.

We alternated between casting to schooling largemouth bass and jigging for bottom-hugging white bass as both species used the same areas and fed on the same sized threadfin shad.

By 9:15a, we’d put 50 fish in the boat when things really got tough.  The sun was intense and the wind dead calm.  Surface action was sparse, so, we had to slowly comb out fish with sonar.

Around 10:10a, we got on what would be the last school we would encounter for the morning.  In 45 feet at the top of a breakline we found schooled white bass with a few largemouth and drum mixed in.  We put a total of 29 more fish in the boat, including our largest white bass of the morning, fishing here with 3/4 oz. white slabs with Hazy Eye Stinger hooks affixed to them.

We were all sweat-soaked by the time the fish quit right around 11a, which make the ride back in, and the breeze we enjoyed during that ride, most welcome.

TALLY: 79 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 6:25am

End Time: 11:00am

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 78F

Water Surface Temp: 85.8F

Wind Speed & Direction: ESE breeze under 2 mph the entire trip; often flat calm

Sky Conditions: Grey cloud bank in the east, but otherwise, <15% clouds

Water Level: 0.26 feet high and steady with only evaporative losses; 0 cfs release at dam

GT = 30

Wx SNAPSHOT:

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area vic 1316 widespread topwater by largemouth on young of the year shad

**Area vic 1960 – white bass on slabs

**Area vic 077/119 widespread topwater by largemouth on young of the year shad

**Area vic 1960 – white bass on slabs for a second round

**Area 1962 – whites, drum, and largemouth from off bottom over a breakline on slabs

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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