Wake up! This is not a joke! We’re going fishing! — 120 fish with the Goods

WHO I FISHED WITH: This past Wednesday morning, September 26th, Dr. Josh Good, a Baylor Scott & White anesthesiologist, slipped into his son’s room after wrapping up his hospital shift just an hour earlier at 5am.  Josh tried to rouse his son who, suspecting his dad was working to wake him up for football practice at the normal time of 6am, resisted.  When Josh told Jacob that he did not have football practice but was instead going fishing on the occasion of his 12th birthday, Jacob was in disbelief.  It wasn’t until his dad showed him my email with details and directions to the boat ramp that he realized this was actually going to happen.

At a few minutes before 7am, I welcomed Josh and Jacob aboard and thus started an awesome morning of pre-frontal fishing on Stillhouse Hollow.

 

Jacob got a reprieve from school and football practice on this, his 12th birthday.  He and his dad, Josh, landed 120 fish.

We caught a nice mix of fish, including 19 largemouth bass, 2 freshwater drum, and 99 white bass.

WHAT WE FISHED FOR:  This was a multi-species trip focused on largemouth and white bass.

WHERE WE FISHED: Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir

WHEN WE FISHED:  Wednesday morning, 26 September 2018

HOW WE FISHED:   This morning we were blessed with pre-frontal conditions.  The season’s first noticeably cool cold front was to move into our area around midday.  We enjoyed the wind shift from S, through SW, to W over the 4+ hours we fished.  All during this time the wind velocity was quite manageable, never exceeding 10mph.  We also had just the thinnest layer of light, white haze to cut the direct rays of the sun as the trip began, and then enjoyed increasing cloud cover thereafter.  The fish fed long and hard this morning, allowing us to catch them by downrigging, by vertical jigging, by working horizontally off bottom, and by sight casting.

Jacob broke the ice this morning with a “triple” on our first attempt at the first place we chose to put lines in the water.  As the bottom just showed to be alive with fish on my sonar screens, I realized that although downrigging would remain effective, working tailspinners from a hover atop these fish would be even more effective.  We had 28 fish in the boat before we moved from that spot less than 40 minutes later.

As we continue looking for fish, I spotted some topwater action from a mix of white bass and schoolie largemouth bass herding shad against the surface.  These shad were ~2.75 inches in length, and most of the fish we caught were just packed full of them.  We sightcast to these fish using long-casting outfits with my 3/8 oz. slabs on the business end until the action died down.  We then spent the remainder of our trip, right up until 11:15, using a smoking tactic with those same slabs to catch white bass by the dozens.  When all was said and done we landed exactly 120 fish of which 2 where freshwater drum, 19 were largemouth, and the remainder were white bass.  The action was non-stop this morning — just right for a 12-year-old boy so as to keep him engaged the entire time.

OBSERVATIONS/NOTES:    Despite several hours of topwater action, no bird activity was witnessed overtop of the action.  The bait the fish were regurgitating this morning were 2.75″ threadfin.  This was in stark contrast with the young of the year shad the fish have been burping up all summer up to this point.  The thermocline numbers looked like this today:

0 feet 81.5

5 feet 81.5

10 feet 81.3

15 feet 81.3

20 feet 81.2

25 feet 81.2

30 feet 81.2

35 feet 80.9

40 feet 79.7

45 feet 77.8

50 feet 68.1

55 feet 63.1

 

TALLY: 120 fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:00 am

End Time: 11:15 am

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 70F

Water Surface Temp:   81.5F

Wind Speed & Direction: 8mph from S, shifting SW, shifting W, then ramping up suddenly from WNW as cold front arrived around 11:50am

Sky Conditions: Thin white haze on a bright sky, slowly clouding to 60% as the front drew nearer

Water Level: 7.92 feet low and falling

GT = 60

Wx SNAPSHOT:  

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area SH0057C – found fish with downriggers and capitalized with tailspinners

**Area SH0041C through SH0058C – spotted topwater action and stayed with the action by moving and sightcasting until the action subsided with a windshift.

**Area SH0059C – smoking 3/8 oz. slabs

**Area v1446 – smoking 3/8 oz. slabs, then returned to sightcasting as the fish made one final binge in advance of the cold front.

 

 

Bob Maindelle, Central Texas Fishing Guide

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingelleTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

Twitter: www/twitter.com/bobmaindelle

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