TECHNIQUE IS EVERYTHING — 51 FISH @ STILLHOUSE

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Monday, August 31st, I fished with first-time guest Mark Kieckhafer who brought his 2 sons, Zach (17) and Connor (16), and his girlfriend’s 2 sons, Mason Severn (14), and Griffin Severn (12).

Mark, who has worked for Wilsonart, a decorative laminate manufacturer, in Temple, for over 20 years now, came in a support role to help me help the boys be successful.

PHOTO CAPTION #1:   Zach Kieckhafer, Connor Kieckhafer, Mason Severn, and Griffin Severn with a portion of our 51 fish take this morning on Stillhouse.    

WHERE WE FISHED: Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir

HOW WE FISHED:   Given the boys’ ages, their prior fishing experience, and how the fishing went this past weekend, I thought we’d be better off at Stillhouse today in pursuit of quality white bass.  

TALLY: 51 fish caught and released (50 white bass, 1 freshwater drum)

OBSERVATIONS:  Largemouth on top, white bass on bottom for middle 2 hours of the trip.  A flock of ~6-7 terns helped us stay on fish in the choppy water, complete with occasional whitecaps.

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:  I could basically cut-and-paste Saturday’s notes here with little variation.  Thanks to stable weather, the fish did the same things at the same times and in the same places as they did over the weekend again today.

We began downrigging for suspended fish found in splintered wolfpacks through about 7:50, taking those fish on twin 3-armed umbrella rigs equipped with Pet Spoons worked at 27-30 feet.  

By 7:50, there was enough light on the water to get the deep bite going on bottom, and abundant shad schools began to show there, as well.

We used MAL Lures in conjunction with Garmin LiveScope to “zig when we needed to zig” — as the LiveScope certainly helps the angler in correctly timing the rise of his bait off bottom so as to intersect with fish moving horizontally.  It seemed the chartreuse MAL Lure had a bit of an edge over the white, perhaps due to the grey cloud cover which was in greater abundance today than over the weekend.

I emphasized over and over to the boys that, when working vertically for white bass, technique is everything.  I provided examples and gentle reminders about using the proper cadence, about how to start the MAL Lure’s blade spinning, how to keep fish from dropping off at the boat, and more.  By the last half of the trip all four boys were remaining tangle-free and landing just about every fish that hit.

The bite weakened around 9:45  — it took us nearly 25 minutes via downrigging to land our last two fish (which turned into 3 fish) as we tried to get our tally to 50 before wrapping up, as the vertical bite completely fell apart by then.

Start Time:  6:30A

End Time: 10:15A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 82F

Elevation:  2.89′ low, -0.04′ 24-hour change, 1 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp:  83.8F

Wind Speed & Direction: SSW8 prior to sunrise, slowly increasing to SSW 13, then gusting .

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous with 97% illumination

GT = 55

Wx SNAPSHOT:    

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 854 – SH0058C – low light downrigging

**Area 062-194 – vertical work with MAL Lures for whites under largemouth

**Area 1427 – vertical work with MAL Lures for whites under largemouth

**Area 258 – last 2 fish caught here on the slope from among a larger, disinterested group

  Bob Maindelle

 

 

Full-time, Professional Fishing Guide and Owner of Holding the Line Guide Service

Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide

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

#WhiteBassFishing #LakeBelton #StillhouseHollow #BeltonFishingGuide #LakeBeltonFishingGuide

#BeltonLakeFishingGuide #stripers #stripedbassfishing #rockfish #sandbass #freshwaterfishing #fishing

#bass #bassfishing #whitebass #panfish #crappie #fishingonaboat #fishingtackle #fishinglife #fishingsport

#fishingaddict #fishingpicoftheday #fishingtime #fishinggear #fishingday

#Fitec

MY SWEET LITTLE BROTHER … THE POTLICKER!!! — 103 FISH @ BELTON

WHO I FISHED WITH: This past Saturday evening, August 29th, I fished for a second time with the entire Olds family from the Austin area.  Joining me this evening were Brian, Tasha, Katelyn (age 12) and Connor (age 8).  They previously came out with me back in November of 2016.

Both Brian and Tasha work in the computer industry, and 2020 has been a very busy one for them thus far. 

They got to squeeze in a few vacation days for the first time in a long time last week, and wanted to do this fishing trip together before the busyness of the new school years with sports-filled weekends, etc. kicks in.  

PHOTO CAPTION #1: The Olds Family — August 2020

PHOTO CAPTION #2: The Olds Family — November 2016  

WHERE WE FISHED: Belton Lake

HOW WE FISHED:   As I thought ahead on how to conduct this trip and keep the kids engaged, my chief concern was the combination of very hot weather and the possibility of slow action in the first half of the trip, leaving the kids too worn out to enjoy the typically solid action from white bass about 1.5 to 2 hours prior to sunset.

Since the kids fished with me previously in November, and since that was 4 years ago, I thought doing something different on this trip would keep them engaged, so, I chose a few shaded areas where I felt our chances at catching sunfish would be strong.  Sunfish typically fall out of my catch by mid-October, but, the hotter the water, the better they bite. We hit two shallow water areas using bream poles and, with Brian’s capable assistance, we kept both Connor and Katelyn on the fish for a full 2+ hours, landed bluegill sunfish, green sunfish, and 1 longear sunfish.

As the kids fished, I noted that Connor had a “tendency” to flip his rig right into the same spot Katelyn had just pulled a sunfish from instead of fishing with confidence in his own areas.  I chuckled when I saw this and told the kids that in the fishing world, this is called “potlicking” and that a person engaged in potlicking is called a potlicker. 

Defined, a potlicker is someone who, instead of having the confidence in their own abilities to find and catch fish, simply looks for others who have found fish and then horns in, uninvited, on top of the person who has already put the work.  After introducing the term, as siblings will, each accused the other fairly routinely of potlicking for the remainder of our trip. Potlicking aside, the kids boated 62 sunfish.

Around 6:30-6:45 we shifted gears and changed our focus to hunting white bass in open water using downriggers.  The fishing was pretty straightforward as we used 3-armed umbrella rigs equipped with Pet Spoons.  We got right into fish after setting the balls to depth, and the frequency of our hookups increased as dark approached.  We took singles, doubles and two sets of triples right up until dark, putting 41 white bass in the boat. 

You can bet the sibs were quite competitive on the downrigging fish count, as well!!  

TALLY: 70 fish caught and released (69 white bass, 1 largemouth bass)

OBSERVATIONS: No observed topwater action.

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time:  4:30PM

End Time: 8:30PM

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 100F

Elevation:  2.75′ low, -0.05′ 24-hour change, 51 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp:  86.0F

Wind Speed & Direction: SSE8.

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous with 86% illumination

GT = 50

Wx SNAPSHOT:  

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area B0032G and B0036G 62 sunfish in first 2 hours

**Area 085 – center of mass for evening downrigging for white bass.  Fished out deeper than this area up to around 7:50, then moved on the shallow side of this area for the last minutes of light.    

 

Bob Maindelle

Full-time, Professional Fishing Guide and Owner of Holding the Line Guide Service

Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide

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

#WhiteBassFishing #LakeBelton #StillhouseHollow #BeltonFishingGuide #LakeBeltonFishingGuide

#BeltonLakeFishingGuide #stripers #stripedbassfishing #rockfish #sandbass #freshwaterfishing #fishing

#bass #bassfishing #whitebass #panfish #crappie #fishingonaboat #fishingtackle #fishinglife #fishingsport

#fishingaddict #fishingpicoftheday #fishingtime #fishinggear #fishingday

#Fitec

WHITE BASS MOSH PIT – 70 FISH @ STILLHOUSE

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Saturday, August 29th, I fished with brothers Stiles and Miles Parker from the Austin area.

Stiles works in the building supply industry, and Miles works in the custom auto industry.  The two share a boat and do a bit of fishing on their own, usually on Decker Lake east of Austin.  Today was, at their request, more of a learning trip than a catching trip, although the catching went very well.

 

PHOTO CAPTION #1: Stiles (left) and Miles Parker with a few of the white bass we downrigged for early in the morning before the vertical bite kicked in allowing us to work MAL Lures beneath the boat for even more fish.

PHOTO CAPTION #2: Miles with a rare 16.25 inch long white bass.  I see 15,000 to 18,000 fish come over the side of my boat each year from Belton and Stillhouse, and not 3 of them will reach this size — a real prize!

WHERE WE FISHED: Stillhouse Hollow

HOW WE FISHED:   The first 75 minutes of the morning was straight downrigging with 3-armed umbrella rigs equipped with Pet Spoons.   As the skies brightened and the wind picked up from the S, then swung SSW, the bite improved as the fish moved onto a deep flat with largemouth working shad near the surface, and white bass working shad near bottom.  

We swapped back and forth between downrigging to find concentrations of bottom-hugging white bass and Spot-Locking atop them to work MAL Lures (white and chartreuse — it didn’t matter which) through them vertically. The fellows were really blown away as I introduced them to Garmin LiveScope technology. 

With the settings set where I have them, we were able to see all of our lures simultaneously, as well as several feet fore and aft of the boat down in ~40 feet of water.  This allowed us to see schools of white bass cruising toward us, thus allowing us to time the rise of our MAL Lures precisely to get bit — just like “leading” a flying bird while shooting a shotgun. On multiple occasions we had large, dense schools of white bass (several hundred in number) bass directly beneath us.  Stiles nicknamed these “mosh pit whites”. 

Whenever the action slowed, we downrigged, found more fish tight to the bottom, and then switched over to vertical work once again. The bite was just about done as 10:30 rolled around, so, once our 70th fish came over the gunwale around that time, we called it an “educational” morning, and headed on in.

TALLY: 70 fish caught and released (69 white bass, 1 largemouth bass)  

OBSERVATIONS:  Black bass on top meant white bass on bottom.  

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time:  6:30A

End Time: 10:35A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 79F

Elevation:  2.80′ low, -0.04′ 24-hour change, 1 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp:  84.0F

Wind Speed & Direction: S4-5 through around 8:45, then increasing to 8-9 and shifting SSW.

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous with 86% illumination

GT = 65

Wx SNAPSHOT:

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1976 to SH0031G to 854 – downrigging with balls around 29 for suspended fish

**Area 070 – first stop for vertical work with MAL Lures

**Area vic SH0033G – vicinity of widespread largemouth/white bass action  

 

Bob Maindelle

Full-time, Professional Fishing Guide and Owner of Holding the Line Guide Service

Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide

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

#WhiteBassFishing #LakeBelton #StillhouseHollow #BeltonFishingGuide #LakeBeltonFishingGuide

#BeltonLakeFishingGuide #stripers #stripedbassfishing #rockfish #sandbass #freshwaterfishing #fishing

#bass #bassfishing #whitebass #panfish #crappie #fishingonaboat #fishingtackle #fishinglife #fishingsport

#fishingaddict #fishingpicoftheday #fishingtime #fishinggear #fishingday

#Fitec

Time to “Rest & Digest” – 103 Fish @ Belton

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Friday, August 28th, I fished with Nathan and Trisha Ratliff and their four kids, Amelia (11), Hannah (10), Hunter (7), and Clara (4), of Harker Heights, TX, on a Kids Fish, Too! adventure on Lake Belton.  

 

PHOTO CAPTION #1: Back row: Nathan and Trisha; front row, from left: Amelia, Hunter, Clara, and Hannah.

 

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

 

HOW WE FISHED:   The Ratliffs arrived with no prior fishing experience and no prior boating experience, so, I planned ahead to have them show up a bit earlier than normal so as to cover things more thoroughly than I might with a family that had prior experience.

Trips like this, with quite an age spread over several kids, can be a bit tough as what it takes to interest and engage an 11-year-old is quite different from what it takes to interest and engage a 4-year-old. My plan was to seek after quantity, and let quality fall where it may so as to keep fish coming over the side of the boat and maintain the kids’ interest over the 3 1/2 hours these kid-specific trips last for.

We started out looking for topwater action which did not materialize thanks to the heavy chop on the water, but, that kept the traffic light and allowed us to get onto fish without company nearby until right as the fish were winding down their low-light feed.  We had the fish to ourselves for about 40 minutes, during which time we put singles and doubles in the boat on downriggers equipped with 3-armed umbrella rigs; only once did we stop to fish MAL Lures, primarily because in the time it would take to make everyone proficient, we’d miss a lot of opportunity for fish on the downriggers which everyone was already now familiar with. 

By the time the low-light feed was over, we’d landed 28 white bass. We gave the white bass time time to ‘rest and digest’ (Amelia really like that term) from their early morning binge by heading up shallow to do some sunfishing with plans to save our final hour to pursue additional white bass out in deeper water. The shallow sunfishing went well.  We landed 40 sunfish (bluegill, greens, and longears).  By around 8:45 AM I was hoping to get back in open water to start hunting white bass again, and, by this time, the kids had landed 30 sunfish.  Amelia asked if she could catch ‘just one more’ about 10 times!  Yep — she’s hooked!  Anyway, we sunfished another 15 minutes and put 10 more fish in the boat for a total of 40 sunfish, then, around 9AM we headed back out for a final hour’s worth of white bass fishing.

We hit two areas, finding fish suspended at 25-27′ deep at the first and finding fish on bottom in 25′ at the second.  In our final hour or so, we landed 3 sets of triples, about as many doubles, and plenty of singles, all in the 0, 1, and 2 year class.  By 10AM, the time we’d all hoped all four kids would be able to make it through, we had 94 fish in the boat.  This time it was dad urging the kids to push on ’til we’d reached 100 fish for the morning. That took all of about 12 minutes as we landed our final triple, four singles, and one double in that span of time.

It’s always nice to be able to “finish strong”, especially with kids on board.

TALLY: 103 fish caught and released (62 white bass, 1 hybrid striper, 40 sunfish)

 

OBSERVATIONS:  ~12 mph chop put would-be surface feeders down this morning, so there was no topwater action where we were.  Sonar lit up and provided ample downrigging opportunities.

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time:  6:30A

End Time: 10:15A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 81F

Elevation:  2.70′ low, -0.06′ 24-hour change, 51 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp:  83.9F

Wind Speed & Direction: Light winds under 3mph from the ENE due to counter-clockwise rotation of the atmosphere impacted by Hurricane Laura Sky Condition: Hazy blue skies

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous with 78% illumination

GT = 0

Wx SNAPSHOT:

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area vic 903 – combination of downrigging and working MAL Lures vertically for low-light fish away from the crowd; lasted until ~7:40

**Area B0163C – 40 sunfish

**Area vic 684 – downrigging for whites (+ 1 hybrid); fish at 25-27′ suspended, balls at 23′

**Area B0021G through B0030G  – downrigging for whites; fish at 25′ on bottom, balls @22′

 

Bob Maindelle

Full-time, Professional Fishing Guide and Owner of Holding the Line Guide Service

Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide

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

#WhiteBassFishing #LakeBelton #StillhouseHollow #BeltonFishingGuide #LakeBeltonFishingGuide

#BeltonLakeFishingGuide #stripers #stripedbassfishing #rockfish #sandbass #freshwaterfishing #fishing

#bass #bassfishing #whitebass #panfish #crappie #fishingonaboat #fishingtackle #fishinglife #fishingsport

#fishingaddict #fishingpicoftheday #fishingtime #fishinggear #fishingday

#Fitec

FROM ROOKIE TO AMATEUR IN 4 HOURS FLAT – 101 FISH @ BELTON

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Tuesday, August 25th, I fished with Shane Stovall and his sons, 14-year-old Connor, and 10-year-old Cooper, all of Salado, TX.

Shane works as a Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist (CRNA) for a local hospital, and was referred to me by Clint Tippett, who makes his living as an anesthesiologist, and also brought his sons, Carson and Carter, out with me back in July.

The boys slowly but surely warmed up to white bass fishing after being sluggish early on.  Their dad and I kidded them about getting lazy and too used to sleeping in over their 5-month-long Spring Break, courtesy of COVID-19!

Perhaps this morning was a good “dry run” for when Salado schools go back in session next week!?

Over the course of the morning, Cooper’s confidence level rose and, after my father-and-sons crew boated their 4th “triple” (three fish caught simultaneously on the 3-armed umbrella rig), he exclaimed, “I think I’ve gone from rookie to amateur.”  He then double-checked that statement with his dad to make sure he’d indicated positive progress. 

 

PHOTO CAPTION #1: From left: Connor, Cooper, and Shane Stovall with a portion of their 101-fish catch on Lake Belton during the last week of their 5-month Spring Break. WHEN WE FISHED: 25 August, 2020, AM

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

HOW WE FISHED:   I’ve been doing more sonar training than fishing lately, given the unstable weather we’ve been experiencing.  Today was the “calm before the storm” in regards to weather in that the impacts of Hurricane Laura are due to be felt beginning tomorrow.

Although the winds were northeasterly today, this was not caused by frontal activity, and, as such, the fish fed well all morning, right up through around 10:50A. We began our day looking for low-light topwater action and found it.  We were able to both downrig around the outskirts of the action for singles and doubles on white bass taken on my 3-armed umbrella rigs, as well as stop over top of several schools of white bass to work MAL Lures through them vertically. We wound up with 31 fish during this low-light bite before the sun got high enough to kill this bite.

We moved on and found fish the remainder of the morning at each of the 3 additional location we searched, but all locations held primarily small fish.  After encountering our first batch of small fish (landing 5), we changed up and headed up shallow to fish for sunfish to give the boys some variety from what was fairly slow downrigging at that point.  I used this time to give the white bass some time to get into more of a feeding mode, hoping either wind, cloud cover, or both might develop. The boys did great at sunfishing for first-timers.  They wound up boating 40 sunfish, including a mix of bluegill, longears, redears, and greens. 

Around 9:30AM, we broke from that and once again pursued white bass.  By this time our fish count stood at 36 white bass and 40 sunfish.

We hit two more areas between 9:30 and 10:50AM, finding ample fish and bait at both.  At both areas small white bass were seen routinely corralling fish to the surface and feeding on them briefly before continuing the pursuit underwater and out of sight.  Also on the nearly calm surface we could see abundant shad feeding in pods right at the surface.

By the time the 4-hour mark rolled around, we’d landed 94 fish and were doing pretty good, albeit still on small fish.  I asked the boys, who by now were sweating through their clothes, if they wanted to press on to try for a 100 fish morning.  They never batted an eye and gave me the thumbs-up. In under 8 minutes we landed another 7 fish, putting our final tally at 101 fish for the morning.

TALLY: 101 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS:  An abundance of shad feeding on the surface under near-calm conditions from 9AM on were noted this morning.

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time:  6:40A

End Time: 10:55A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 73F

Elevation:  2.57′ low, -0.05′ 24-hour change, 51 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp:  83.5F

Wind Speed & Direction: Light winds under 3mph from the ENE due to counter-clockwise rotation of the atmosphere impacted by Hurricane Laura

Sky Condition: Clear blue skies and low humidity

Moon Phase: First quarter with 47% illumination

GT = 30

Wx SNAPSHOT:

  

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1781 – initial contact with low-light topwater fish

**Area vic 903 – combination of downrigging and working MAL Lures vertically for low-light fish away from the crowd

**Area vic B0040C – downrigging in ~22′ for smallish fish — moved on

**Area B0034G – 40 sunfish

**Area vic 1097 – downrigging for small whites

**Area 475-477 – downrigging for small whites

 

Bob Maindelle

Full-time, Professional Fishing Guide and Owner of Holding the Line Guide Service

Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide

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

#WhiteBassFishing #LakeBelton #StillhouseHollow #BeltonFishingGuide #LakeBeltonFishingGuide

#BeltonLakeFishingGuide #stripers #stripedbassfishing #rockfish #sandbass #freshwaterfishing #fishing

#bass #bassfishing #whitebass #panfish #crappie #fishingonaboat #fishingtackle #fishinglife #fishingsport

#fishingaddict #fishingpicoftheday #fishingtime #fishinggear #fishingday

#Fitec

SKIFF (Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun) — 49 Fish

WHO I FISHED WITH:  On Wednesday, August 19th, I conducted the season’s 9th Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun (SKIFF) program trip with three young men from Killeen — 7-year-old Marcus Grady, 7-year-old Isaiah Davis, and 6-year-old Elijah Davis.

Their step-father, U.S. Army Staff Sergeant Sylvester Grady is currently away from Ft. Hood, serving at Fort Benning, Georgia.  He has been in the military for over 20 years.

ABOUT SKIFF:  This fishing trip was provided to this military family at no charge.  S.K.I.F.F. stands for Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun.  This program began in May of 2009.  It is funded by the donations and fundraising efforts of the Austin Fly Fishers and other organizations they have partnered with.  S.K.I.F.F. provides the children of military personnel separated from their families due to duty commitments with the opportunity to go fishing.  SKIFF trips are also provided, free of charge, to Gold Star families who have lost their service member while he or she was on active duty.  In mid-2019, SKIFF also began providing trips to dependents whose parents are bona fide disabled veterans.  I coordinate and conduct these 3.5 to 4 hour adventures on Belton Lake and Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir, just outside the gates of Fort Hood in Bell County, TX, year ’round.  Call or text 254.368.7411.

 

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Isaiah Davis, Elijah Davis, and Marcus Grady landed 49 fish during their evening adventure on Lake Belton.  This trip was provided free of charge courtesy of the Austin Fly Fishers and other SKIFF supporters.

 

WHEN WE FISHED:  19 August, 2020, PM

HOW WE FISHED: Since the boys were young, and none of the three of them had ever fished before, we kept it very basic this evening.

Since we were still under the influence of Monday’s cold front passage, I suspected the white bass would be catchable, but would still require more effort than during more ideal conditions, so, I save the white bass effort for just a short part of our time at the end of the trip as the sun was setting.

Prior to that, we hit two areas up shallow for sunfish, where the boys were able to hook and land 40 sunfish, including longear, bluegill, and green sunfish.  We used long rods, balsa floats, and small hooks and split shot to present small live baits to these fish in under 4 feet of water.

Around 7:15P, the sun sank below a bank of grey clouds in the western sky, thus immediately dimming the ambient light level and making it cooler to the point of being pleasant, given the low humidity which the cold front brought with it.

From that point forward we began downrigging with two sets of 3-armed umbrella rigs.  Each boy got to land 3 white bass over the course of the next hour.  By about 8:15, the boys were ready to move on to supper.  Hence, we finished up the trip with 49 fish caught and released.

TALLY:  49 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS:  Thanks to N winds at ~9-10 and some building cloud cover, the fishing began to rebound from Tuesday’s bright, calm, post-frontal scenario.  Fish were still a bit reluctant.  I watched our downrigger ball present our 3-armed umbrella rigs right to numerous schools of white bass which failed to show any response at all.  The shallower and more horizontally spread the pre-sunset white bass were, the more likely they were to strike.

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time:  5:15P

End Time: 8:15P

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 97F

Elevation:  2.31′ low, 0.04′ fall, 51 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp: 86.8

Wind Speed & Direction: NNE11

Sky Conditions: 30% white cloud cover on a blue sky; around 7:15, the sun was obscured by a thick grey cloud bank in the west.

Moon: New Moon today

GT =  NA

Wx SNAPSHOT: 

 

 AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area B0035G – sunfish

**Area 1583 – sunfish

**Area 085 – early evening white bass

**Area vic B0154C – late evening white bass

 

 

Bob Maindelle

Full-time, Professional Fishing Guide and Owner of Holding the Line Guide Service

Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide

254.368.7411 (call or text)

 

#WhiteBassFishing #LakeBelton #StillhouseHollow #BeltonFishingGuide #LakeBeltonFishingGuide

#BeltonLakeFishingGuide #stripers #stripedbassfishing #rockfish #sandbass #freshwaterfishing #fishing

#bass #bassfishing #whitebass #panfish #crappie #fishingonaboat #fishingtackle #fishinglife #fishingsport

#fishingaddict #fishingpicoftheday #fishingtime #fishinggear #fishingday

#Fitec

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

Twitter: www.twitter.com/bobmaindelle

Pre-frontal? Post-frontal? What’s it gonna be? 51 fish @ Belton

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Monday, August 17th, I fished with Shane LaCanne and his 7-year-old son, Fisher, of Salado.  This was a “Kids Fish, Too!” package trip, tailored just for elementary-aged kids.  Such trips have a reduced duration and a reduced price tag versus adult trips.

Shane brought both of his boys out with me once before, but this trip was just for Fisher, in celebration of his birthday back in July.

Today’s big story was the weather.  Last night, a cold front pushed through very suddenly with brief, strong winds and a bit of rain.  As we were on the southernmost extreme of that system, no sooner did the front pass, than our winds, which blew NW from around 2:30A to 3:15A, turned right back around out of the south. It is really hard to classify this as pre-frontal, because it wasn’t until around 9:30AM that the winds finally changed to a northerly component for keeps.  At that time the fishing, which was average this morning, began to sour quickly.

One thing is for sure, I will be doing sonar training on Tuesday and Wednesday to avoid the no-doubt tough fishing over the next 2 days with light northerly winds and bright, cloudless skies!  

PHOTO CAPTION #1:  7-year-old Fisher LaCanne and his dad, Shane, with the two best fish Fisher landed on our 51-fish outing under “squirrely” wind and weather conditions.

WHEN WE FISHED: 17 August, 2020, AM

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

HOW WE FISHED:  The crazy weather definitely impacted the early morning, low-light topwater bite, as it was essentially non-existent this morning.  I spotted only 2 instances of topwater feeding whites all morning, both of which were witnessed after 8AM and only for a few seconds. So, we moved back out to mid-depths, found shad, and began to work near where bait was abundant, but not relaxed (meaning, it was balled up and in a defensive posture). 

We downrigged for a solid hour, putting 17 white bass and 1 blue cat in the boat, all the while never finding a single scenario which convinced me to pull up the ‘riggers and go vertical with MAL Lures.  Since most of these fish were on the small side anyway, we left these fish to look for greener pastures.

The second area we fished was more productive, and was also later in time from the early morning’s frontal passage.  Again, we found abundant bait and that bait was in balls, up off bottom.  I intended to begin searching with ‘riggers down, but almost immediately came upon a sizeable school of bottom-hugging white bass which I felt certain would respond to a smoking tactic with MAL Lures.  We got the boat in a hover over these fish, let the lures down, and the fish were all over them.

Over the next 90 minutes we alternated between downrigging to find schools of bottom-dwelling white bass and then fishing vertically for them as long as they would bite.  We added another 33 white bass to our catch. The catch rate began to slow rapidly around 9:30 when the winds finally took on a northerly direction after swinging from S, through W in the time between pre-dawn and 9:30.

In our final 45 minutes on the water, we caught only 6 fish, and all of them came on the downrigger as we had to get our baits in front of a mess of disinterested fish in order to strain out a few still willing to bite.

TALLY: 51 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS: 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time:  6:30A

End Time: 10:15A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 74F

Elevation:  2.19′ low, -0.01′ 24-hour change, 51 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp:  84.2F

Wind Speed & Direction: S12 before sunrise, calming to S6 shortly thereafter, then slowly shifting SSW, SW, W, then WNW by 9:30A Sky Condition: ~15% white cloud cover with light blue skies and low humidity

Moon Phase: Waning crescent with 3% illumination; 2 days ’til new moon

GT = 25

Wx SNAPSHOT:  Two wx snapshots I took today; one taken at 4AM, the other at 6AM, as the wind forecast direction changed drastically:

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area  vic B0133C to B0024G – 18 fish via downrigging with many small fish in the mix

**Area vic 788 – 2+ hours of catching, tapering sharply around 9:30A with a windshift to the NW

 

Bob Maindelle

Full-time, Professional Fishing Guide and Owner of Holding the Line Guide Service

Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide

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

#WhiteBassFishing #LakeBelton #StillhouseHollow #BeltonFishingGuide #LakeBeltonFishingGuide

#BeltonLakeFishingGuide #stripers #stripedbassfishing #rockfish #sandbass #freshwaterfishing #fishing

#bass #bassfishing #whitebass #panfish #crappie #fishingonaboat #fishingtackle #fishinglife #fishingsport

#fishingaddict #fishingpicoftheday #fishingtime #fishinggear #fishingday

#Fitec

PLANS TO MAKE THAT FIRST BILLION — 40 FISH @ STILLHOUSE

WHO I FISHED WITH: This past Saturday morning, 15 August 2020, I fished with Cullen Mills and his 10-year-old son, Noah, on Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir.

Cullen makes a living running the family business, Modern TV and Appliance, in Killeen.  This business has been in the family for several generations and was at one time run by T.J. Mills, after whom T.J. Mills Boulevard on Fort Hood is named.

Of the two, Noah is the more “hardcore” angler and was just thirsty for knowledge about fish and fishing.

I was impressed at how well-spoken Noah was, and the sort of pretty insightful questions he asked.

Somewhere in our conversation Noah spoke of having big dreams, including becoming a billionaire.  When I asked if he had a plan to help achieve that dream, he told me of his plans to develop a jet-powered automobile — kinda’ George Jetson-style.  How many 10-year-olds (or 30-year-olds, for that matter) have a goal for their lives?

 

PHOTO CAPTION #1: Cullen and Noah Mills with a sampling of Stillhouse Hollow’s quality white bass.  The two plump specimens Noah displays each exceeded 14″ in length.

WHEN WE FISHED: 16 August, 2020, AM

WHERE WE FISHED: Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir

HOW WE FISHED: As we met at the courtesy dock around 6:30, I went over the morning’s game plan.  We would employ two tactics for white bass: downrigging and “smoking” vertically with MAL Lures.  We’d also save time at the end of the trip to introduce Noah to fishing for shallow water sunfish so that either on foot or on his grandpa’s boat, he could be sure to catch fish during the warm-water season.

This game plan worked out well for us.  The fish were a bit “reserved” in the first 90 minutes of the morning as the winds were barely moving the water’s surface.  We graphed a lot more fish than we had bite, but kept a steady feed of singles and doubles coming in the boat, and, every one of them were in great shape, length-wise and girth-wise.  We even managed one triple! All of these fish were suspended in small “wolfpacks” of 6-20 fish, holding at 28-35 feet down.

We ran our downrigger balls at 28 and 30 feet with a silver/white trio of #12 Pet Spoons on one ‘rigger and a silver/yellow trio of #13 Pets on the other.  The smaller white/silver did seem to do a bit better, albeit barely.

As the winds came up and shifted from S to SSW, I began looking in shallower areas where the bottom was located shallower than the thermocline.  Two of the areas we checked held fish in the lower 3 feet of the water column, thus allowing us to fish MAL Lures vertically to catch a number of fish quickly while sitting atop these fish in a hover.

I noted a tendency in these fish which I also noted this past Friday on Lake Belton … that was for these fish to move on pretty quickly.  Even though we were catching fish, and even though I beat the surface to create commotion to imitate surface feeding to draw fish in, we would only pick up a few fish at a time before having to “jog” one way or another to reconnect with the fish.

By the time 10:15 rolled around, the white bass were beginning to get really sluggish and unresponsive, so, we closed out that portion of our trip and headed up shallow to introduce Noah to sunfishing.

The dropping water level hindered the sunfishing a bit, as the coves where these fish tend to locate are somewhat clogged with hydrilla now left matted over on the surface, which makes presentation of baits much more challenging, especially for kids not accustomed to using the poles I incorporate into this technique. Regardless, Noah yanked 5 sunfish in 8 strikes and, when asked by his dad, “Are you having fun?”, Noah replied, “Too much fun!!”.

TALLY: 40 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS: As they did at Belton on Friday, the white bass seemed reluctant to “stay put” once located this morning, forcing us to move and make “short hops” when fishing vertically with MAL Lures.

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time:  6:30A

End Time: 10:55A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 78F

Elevation:  2.13′ low, -0.05′ 24-hour change, 1 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp:  84.7F

Wind Speed & Direction: S13-14 before sunrise, dropping off to S11 right around sunrise.

Sky Condition: ~15% white cloud cover with light blue skies and low humidity

Moon Phase: Waning crescent with 16% illumination

GT = 0

Wx SNAPSHOT:

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area  vic SH0030G – low light downrigging for suspended wolfpacks of white bass

**Area vic 197 – vertical work with MAL Lures for fish holding on bottom, shallower than the thermocline

**Area vic SH0052 – downrigged here briefly and moved on after seeing only a few, widely spread schools of suspended white bass

**Area vic SH0122C/662 – vertical work with MAL Lures for fish holding on bottom, shallower than the thermocline

**Area SH0132C – sunfish

Bob Maindelle

Full-time, Professional Fishing Guide and Owner of Holding the Line Guide Service

Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide

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

#WhiteBassFishing #LakeBelton #StillhouseHollow #BeltonFishingGuide #LakeBeltonFishingGuide

#BeltonLakeFishingGuide #stripers #stripedbassfishing #rockfish #sandbass #freshwaterfishing #fishing

#bass #bassfishing #whitebass #panfish #crappie #fishingonaboat #fishingtackle #fishinglife #fishingsport

#fishingaddict #fishingpicoftheday #fishingtime #fishinggear #fishingday

#Fitec

WHAT’S THE GOOD WORD?? — 108 FISH @ BELTON

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Friday, August 14th, I fished with Bob “Paw Paw” Word, and his three grandsons, Justin Word, Jordan Word, and Travis Scott.

Bob retired from civil service as a welder and resides south of Killeen.

Justin and Jordan are brothers, and Travis married their sister. 

All of the grandsons live around Austin where Jordan works as a building inspector, Justin works for the Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA), and Travis is a K-9 police officer.

PHOTO CAPTION #1:   From left: Travis Scott, and Jordan, Bob, and Justin Word, all with 2-year old white bass taken with a combination of downrigging and vertical work with MAL Lures.  

WHEN WE FISHED: 14 August, 2020, AM

 WHERE WE FISHED: Belton Lake

 HOW WE FISHED:  We looked for “easy” topwater action this morning but found none, thanks to the heavy chop on the surface.  So, we downrigged for the fish that were still there and feeding, but not showing themselves on the surface.  We wound up with 8 fish and moved on just as the sun rose.

I spotted multiple occasions of “popcorn” schooling as I surveyed calmer waters, but these fish did not stay up long, so, we passed on them.

We eventually found fish in 25-29 feet of water, and they “carpeted” the bottom, a good sign of their willingness to strike lures presented vertically.  Indeed, the fish were willing to strike, but, they were also very prone to moving. 

Seeing this, we simply bounced back and forth for the remainder of the morning between downrigging to both find and catch fish, and then stopping on top of any large (100+ fish) schools we found in order to work MAL Lures vertically.  We’d catch a few before the school moved on using the MAL Lures, then, it was back to downrigging to repeat the process.

A mixed presentation of white/silver #12 Pet Spoons on one 3-armed umbrella rig and yellow/silver #13 Pet Spoons on the other 3-armed rig worked equally well.

We wound up with 108 fish landed in right at 4 hours.  This included fish in the 0, 1, and 2 year classes.  Looks like a great crop of white bass was spawned this year based on the size of fish I’m seeing from this spring’s spawn (we caught ~10-12 of them, all right about the same size and looking plump).

TALLY: 108 fish caught and released  

OBSERVATIONS:  Low-light topwater fish were definitely “off” this morning, thanks to a heavy chop created by the 13+ mph wind we experienced.  Fish were present, but did not pop up on top for an extended period of time.  After sunrise, “popcorn” schooling took place briefly through about 8AM, then the fish went down for good.  

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time:  6:30A  

End Time: 10:45A  

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 79F  

Elevation:  2.09′ low, -0.12′ 24-hour change, 51 CFS flow  

Water Surface Temp:  83.5F  

Wind Speed & Direction: S13-14 before sunrise, dropping off to S11 right around sunrise.   Sky Condition:  No cloud cover, with light blue skies and low humidity

Moon Phase: Waning crescent with 24% illumination  

GT = 50  

Wx SNAPSHOT:

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:  

**Area  vic 813 – downrigging in under 20′ on wind-impacted shoreline for low-light white bass action hindered by strong wave action.

**Area vic 1024 – back and forth between downrigging to catch and find fish, and then dropping MAL Lures on active fish to take advantage of what we’d found.  

 

Bob Maindelle

Full-time, Professional Fishing Guide and Owner of Holding the Line Guide Service

Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide

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

#WhiteBassFishing #LakeBelton #StillhouseHollow #BeltonFishingGuide #LakeBeltonFishingGuide

#BeltonLakeFishingGuide #stripers #stripedbassfishing #rockfish #sandbass #freshwaterfishing #fishing

#bass #bassfishing #whitebass #panfish #crappie #fishingonaboat #fishingtackle #fishinglife #fishingsport

#fishingaddict #fishingpicoftheday #fishingtime #fishinggear #fishingday

#Fitec

S.K.I.F.F. (Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun) – 60 Fish

WHO I FISHED WITH:  On Wednesday, August 12th, I conducted the season’s 8th Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun (SKIFF) program trip with Victoria (age 8) and Derrick (age 6) Rosado, accompanied by their mother, Valerie Gonzalez.

Neither child had ever been on a boat, nor landed a fish before this evening.

U.S. Army Specialist Christian Rosado is currently deployed to Poland. Shortly after his return, he will leave once again for training at Fort Irwin, California.

ABOUT SKIFF:  This fishing trip was provided to this military family at no charge.  S.K.I.F.F. stands for Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun.  This program began in May of 2009.  It is funded by the donations and fundraising efforts of the Austin Fly Fishers and other organizations they have partnered with.  S.K.I.F.F. provides the children of military personnel separated from their families due to duty commitments with the opportunity to go fishing.  SKIFF trips are also provided, free of charge, to Gold Star families who have lost their service member while he or she was on active duty.  In mid-2019, SKIFF also began providing trips to dependents whose parents are bona fide disabled veterans.  I coordinate and conduct these 3.5 to 4 hour adventures on Belton Lake and Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir, just outside the gates of Fort Hood in Bell County, TX, year ’round.  Call or text 254.368.7411.

 

PHOTO CAPTION: Derrick and Victoria Rosado landed 60 fish tonight on Lake Belton.  This was their first fishing trip ever!  You can see little Derrick was still not real sure about those fish coming too close to him!

 

WHEN WE FISHED:  12 August, 2020, PM

HOW WE FISHED:  Just as the last hour (which is typically the hottest and brightest) of a summer morning trip is often the least productive, so the first hour (also typically the hottest and brightest) of a summer evening trip is often the least productive.

Understanding this, we focused on fishing for sunfish up shallow on a (shaded) west shoreline until around 6:45PM, when I felt the first of the evening’s white bass feed would begin in open water.

Derrick took a long time to warm up to the idea of fishing.  While Victoria jumped right in there and landed sunfish after sunfish, including longears, bluegill, redears, and greens, Derrick landed his first and then retreated to the safety of mom as his sister amassed a handsome catch of 30 fish.

By around the 1 hour mark, the novelty of sunfishing had begun to wear thin, and Victoria expressed an interest in doing something different.

We began pursuing white bass with downriggers in open water and this kept the kids’ attention right up until the close of our trip at sunset.  We added 29 white bass to the 31 sunfish they’d landed, for a total of 60 fish for the night.

We caught fish equally well on silver/white #12 Pets and silver/yellow #13 Pets.  We set the ‘rigger balls at ~22’ and never moved them.  We landed singles, doubles, and one triple (way to go Derrick!!).

TALLY: 60 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS:  Too windy for topwater action tonight.

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time:  5:15P

End Time: 8:45P

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 100F

Elevation:  1.98′ low, 0.05′ fall, 51 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp:  87.6F

Wind Speed & Direction: S8-9

Sky Conditions: 75% white cloud cover on a blue sky

Moon: Waning crescent with 42% illumination

GT =  NA

Wx SNAPSHOT: 

 

 AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area B0163C  – 31 sunfish

**Area vic 085 – 29 white bass all via downrigging

 

 

 

Bob Maindelle

Full-time, Professional Fishing Guide and Owner of Holding the Line Guide Service

Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide

254.368.7411 (call or text)

 

#WhiteBassFishing #LakeBelton #StillhouseHollow #BeltonFishingGuide #LakeBeltonFishingGuide

#BeltonLakeFishingGuide #stripers #stripedbassfishing #rockfish #sandbass #freshwaterfishing #fishing

#bass #bassfishing #whitebass #panfish #crappie #fishingonaboat #fishingtackle #fishinglife #fishingsport

#fishingaddict #fishingpicoftheday #fishingtime #fishinggear #fishingday

#Fitec

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

Twitter: www.twitter.com/bobmaindelle