This past Monday morning, July 3, I fished with the Rivera family of Salado.

 

Jana and Andrew landed this pair of 2-year class white bass within seconds of one another.

 

Samuel kept quiet, stayed focused, and was the most consistent angler of the family today with quiet intensity working for him.

That grin says it all!

Mr. Richard Rivera is a cabinet maker who now serves as stay-at-home dad to his two boys, Samuel, age 15, and Andrew, age 10. Jana Rivera is an anesthesiologist working at Baylor Scott and White. The boys are home schooled and are also a part of the Providence Academy in Belton.

The family had been on one previous fishing trip – – an Alaskan salmon fishing trip some time ago. So, fishing warm water and locally was a new experience for them. We met at 6:15 AM and, after adjusting equipment to their preferences and a word of prayer, we launched out in search of fish.

We got our first hookup on downrigger number one before downrigger number two ever got sent down to depth. During our first 90 minutes on the water we landed singles and doubles and tallied a catch of 32 fish before the lowlight bite broke down, sending us looking elsewhere.

I headed deeper at this point and begin searching for large congregations of white bass in 40 to 60 feet of water. We stopped five different times over five different loose congregations of fish before finding a group that was really fired up and ready to feed. At each of the stops we picked up at least a drum and perhaps one or two white bass, but the fish never really got excited, even when hooked fish were being reeled up.

At our last location, in 48 feet of water, we put exactly 85 fish in the boat in our last 2 1/2 hours on the water, taking our tally up to 123 fish for the morning. All of these fish from deepwater came on a Redneck Fish’n’  Jigs Model 180 slab, in white, three-quarter ounce, and retrofitted with a Hazy Eye Stinger hook.

TALLY: 123 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 6:15a

End Time: 10:30a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 80F

Water Surface Temp: 83.7F

Wind Speed & Direction: SSE9 at trip’s start, tapering up to SSE11-14

Sky Conditions: 10% clouds on a fair sky following the passage of morning storm cells

Water Level: 0.38 feet high and steady; 0 cfs release at dam

GT = 0

Wx SNAPSHOT:

 

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 799 downrigging early for 32 fish

**Area 879 slabbing for 91 fish

 

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

Twitter: www.twitter.com/bobmaindelle

This past Saturday afternoon I fished a four hour afternoon trip on Stillhouse with Drew Gresham, his four-year-old so, Wynn, a client of Drew’s, Harris Rose, and Harris’ eight-year-old son, Ethan.

 

Drew and Wynn with one of the many white bass we tracked down this morning.  Wynn was enthusiastic about every single fish we caught over a full four hours.  I’ve never seen a kid that young stay so excited about one thing for that length of time.

 

Harris and Ethan with a “schoolie” largemouth.  Largemouth regularly show up mixed in with white bass when both species hunt young-of-the-year shad in the heat of the summer .

I was a bit reluctant to even book this trip given the forecast heat and the age of these two boys, but didn’t have a morning opening anytime in the next three weeks to offer as an alternative, and, with an assurance from Drew that his son could hang with us the whole time, we went ahead and scheduled the outing.

Both men let me know that as long as the boys were having fun, they, too, would be having fun and so I was free to focus on the boys.

In the interest of “instant gratification” so as to keep the boys attention, I went shallow for sunfish right off the bat and, in under an hour’s time, enabled the kids, aided by their fathers, to put 32 sunfish in the boat including bluegill, longear, and green sunfish.

Chapter 2 of our four-part trip involved downrigging over a mid-depth breakline that topped out around 34 feet. This downrigging allowed us to cover a good bit of water and catch fish while at the same time continue watching sonar for heavy concentrations of bottom oriented fish that could be jigged for. Although many people don’t think of downrigging as engaging, I choose to teach my clients to set up their own rigs, so the process of getting baits down to the fish is very hands-on. So, both father and son teams worked well together and we put a steady stream of fish over the side of the boat including singles and doubles until I was able to find fish we could jig for.

This opened the third chapter of our trip – – working slabs vertically for heavily congregated white bass. This was by far the most productive of all of our attempts this afternoon. I do believe that the unstable weather of the morning which put the bite off significantly, caused the fish to feed more heavily than normal this evening. We sat in one boat sized area and kept the fish jazzed for nearly 2 hours and put almost 100 fish in the boat from this area alone.

When this bite began to soften about an hour before sunrise, we downrigged for a few more fish in this vicinity and then moved to our final location to downrig once again in water about 35 feet deep with balls set around 24 feet deep.

We finished the trip with 156 fish landed. Both dads said that the variety of techniques was just right for their sons.

 

TALLY: 156 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 4:45p

End Time: 8:45p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 94F

Water Surface Temp: 85.7F

Wind Speed & Direction: SSE14 at trip’s start, tapering down to SSE10 by trip’s end

Sky Conditions: 10% clouds on a fair sky following the passage of morning storm cells

Water Level: 0.35 feet high and slowly falling thanks to evaporation; 0 cfs release at dam

GT = 120

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 176, Area 649, and Area 1564 – downrigging under murky skies with a slow, steady bite in the first 90 minutes

**Area 915, 921, and 915/889 – slabbing in deep water for bottom-hugging whites

**Area 534 and 189 – sunfish on slipfloats

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

Twitter: www.twitter.com/bobmaindelle

This past Saturday morning I fished on Stillhouse with Lieutenant Colonel David Bowers, his four year old son, Kayden, and family friend, Trent Tate.

 

From left: David, Kayden, and Trent with a pair of 3-year class white bass that fell for our slabs from out of deep water at mid-morning before incoming storms dampened the bite.

 

Largemouth are routinely mixed in with deeply schooled white bass all year.  This summer the size of those largemouth has been much improved over the smaller, 12-14 inch “schoolies” typically encountered in such scenarios.

 

David just moved from Ft. Bragg, NC, to Georgetown, TX, where he’ll commute to Ft. Hood after just taking command of an intelligence battalion.  Beyond catching fish, one of David’s intentions was to understand the tactics required for our local waters, given that Stillhouse and Lake Georgetown fish very similarly.

The fishing was a bit lower key this morning then during this past week, thanks to unstable weather. The entire morning oscillated between cloudy and bright, dry and rainy, calm and windy.

Under low light conditions, with the sunrise only slightly obscured by haze, we experienced a short, but strong bite on the downriggers, working them for suspended fish in 22 to 27 feet of water over a deeper bottom. Even during this lowlight time, things were a bit more subdued, as I only found fish holding in groups of threes or fours, not big schools roaming all over the place as they had been earlier in the week in this first locale we fished in this morning.

We moved to a second, then a third area and continued downrigging, with slow, limited success.

By around 8:30, and with 14 fish landed, we made a big move into deeper, clearer water, as I began to seek out congregations of bottom hugging white bass in deep water holding on irregularities in the bottom, in hopes of working slabs over these fish.

After enjoying only limited success in the first three areas we stopped at, we finally got into a group of fish that remained under the boat for quite some time and bit readily. We put exactly 30 fish in the boat taking our tally up to 44. A rainshower moved in from the southwest on a windshift and killed the bite for a while, but, the fishing bounced back as the weather cleared and we were able to put a final seven gamefish in the boat before wrapping up by taking Kayden up shallow to enjoy some sunfish action.

Using a slip float in worm, Kayden managed a bream pole very well for a four-year-old and put seven sunfish in the boat in short order. With another, stronger cell of weather headed our way as indicated by weather radar, we decided it was a good time to call it quits right at the 4.25 hour mark.

We ended the trip with 58 fish.  This was the first trip of the last seven that did not produce at least 100 fish, underscoring the impact that stable versus unstable weather has on the fishing. Fortunately, the forecast for the week of July 3^rd-8^th looks like stable, “cookie-cutter” weather which should see fishing bounce back again.

TALLY: 58 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 6:15a

End Time: 10:30a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 80F

Water Surface Temp: 83.3F

Wind Speed & Direction: Winds varied in speed and direction this morning with some instability in the wx.  We began with SE winds at under 9, saw a swing through to the S with an increase to 12, then a wild swing through the west, then NW with winds at 13-14 on the lead edge of two storm cells that passed through in rapid succession

Sky Conditions: 100% cloudy conditions, with murky skies in the first 90 minutes hampering the bite.

Water Level: 0.35 feet high and slowly falling thanks to evaporation; 0 cfs release at dam

GT = 85

Wx SNAPSHOT:

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 176, Area 649, and Area 1564 – downrigging under murky skies with a slow, steady bite in the first 90 minutes

**Area 915, 921, and 915/889 – slabbing in deep water for bottom-hugging whites

**Area 534 and 189 – sunfish on slipfloats

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

Twitter: www.twitter.com/bobmaindelle

This past Friday morning I fished with Jerry Morgan and his son and daughter-in-law, Chris and Holly Morgan.

 

From left: Chris, Jerry, and Holly Morgan with a sampling of the deepwater white bass we found in ~56 feet of water slowly combing over bottom with sonar.

 

Holly landed a triple early in the game — catching 3 fish on each of the Pet Spoons on a 3-armed umbrella rig.

Chris landed a multi-species double by catching a largemouth bass on the treble hook of a slab and a white bass on the Hazy Eye Stinger hook I retrofit all of my slabs with.

Jerry landed the big fish of the trip — a 3.3 pound largemouth which hit his 3/4 oz slab.  We lost several like this one right at the boat as they rose quickly from the depths and did the characteristic “largemouth head shake” right at the surface.

Jerry worked in the grocery business most of his career and then, for the last ten years before retiring, taught high school students at Shoemaker High School in Killeen. Chris is the offensive line coach for the Atlanta Falcons and graduated from Killeen High School.  He met Holly during his college years.  They have twin 4-year old boys and an 8 year-old daughter.

I was a bit concerned about how today’s trip would pan out because, for the last several days, much of our success came on fish feeding on young-of-the year shad at the surface.  Today’s high winds were not going to allow for spotting such activity if it even developed.

As we got going, we began downrigging in the same vicinity that has produced fish all week in the opening hour of the trip.  Today, the action was just as strong as before, but, as the skies brightened, the time at which top water feeding began on Monday through Thursday saw a downturn in action today.  We enjoyed a brief spurt of action using slabs in a vertical presentation, but after that dried up, the entire area went quiet.

We went about 45 minutes without fish from about 7:45a to 8:30a before I moved us to the most wind-exposed area I could find, hoping the moving water would have some deepwater fish stirred up.

With just a little bit of sonar effort, we found what we were looking for.  Atop Area 1956 we put over 100 fish in the boat over a 2 hour span, including 1, 2, and 3 year old white bass,  largemouth up to 3.3 pounds, and even a few freshwater drum for variety’s sake.

TALLY: 133 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 6:15a

End Time: 10:30a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 80F

Water Surface Temp: 83.1F

Wind Speed & Direction: SSW winds at 13 at trip’s start, building to SSW18 by trip’s end

Sky Conditions: 100% cloudy conditions slowly cleared to 50% clouds by trip’s end

Water Level: 0.35 feet high and stable; 0 cfs release at dam

GT = 85

Wx SNAPSHOT:

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1043-1908-1951 – downrigging under low light conditions for aggressive, suspended white bass, yielding singles, doubles, triples on Pet Spoons; 32 fish

**Area 1956 – 2 hours’ worth of slabbing for 101 fish; mixed back of whites, blacks, drum

 

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

Twitter: www.twitter.com/bobmaindelle

This past Thursday morning I fished with Dr. Ron Grimwood and retired physician Dr. John Greene.

 

From left: Dr. Ron Grimwood and Dr. John Greene with a sampling of the largemouth we caught on small, shad-imitating paddle-tail grubs as they fed heavily on the surface for the first several hours of this morning’s trip.  Although there were certainly average-sized “schoolies” as are typically found feeding in topwater schools, there were also quality 3-4 pound fish like these mixed in as well.

 

After the surface bite died, we went deep and found more 2-3 year class fish than we did yearlings holding in deep schools in over 60′.  Slabs worked vertically did the trick for these heavily congregated fish.

I’d first met John, a retired pathologist, back in 2013 when he arranged for a summertime fishing trip for his two grandsons from Kentucky.  This was the first time I’d met Ron, a dermatologist at Baylor Scott & White.  A friend of his, Dr. Chad Housewright, presented him with a fishing gift certificate for two last year, and so today was the day to redeem it.

We had stable, grey, mild conditions this morning which were, once again, just right for topwater action.

After a brief, but action-packed, downrigging session in which we landed 17 singles, doubles, and triples of white bass on 3-armed umbrella rigs equipped with Pet Spoons, we transitioned right into casting to surface-feeding fish once they appeared in force on the surface just a few minutes before 7am.

We stuck with this aggressive, engaging surface activity for about 2.5 hours until it finally died.  During the frenzy, we cast paddle-tail grubs on jigheads and used a fast retrieve to imitate escaping young-of-the-year shad.  When the surface went temporarily quiet, I’d use sonar to find bottom-hugging schools of white bass (which seemed to be everywhere), and we’d fish slabs vertically with a smoking tactic until more surface action erupted.

Around 9:30am, the topwater bonanza ended and we searched for deeper schools of white bass in water as much as 62 feet deep and closed out the trip catching these fish on smoked slabs.

TALLY: 107 FISH, all caught and released

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 6:15a

End Time: 10:15a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 73F

Water Surface Temp: 83.1F

Wind Speed & Direction: SSE6 most of the trip

Sky Conditions: Once the sun cleared a grey cloud bank in the east, we had increasingly clear skies to ~30% cloud cover by trip’s end

Water Level: 0.34 feet high and slowly rising; 0 cfs release at dam

GT = 100

Wx SNAPSHOT:

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 723-781 – downrigging under low light conditions for aggressive, suspended white bass, yielding singles, doubles, triples on Pet Spoons

**Area 781-1908 – 2.5 full hours of casting to topwater action

**Area 915 – last 45 minutes spent working slabs with smoking tactic for deep, heavily congregated white bass

 

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

Twitter: www.twitter.com/bobmaindelle