WHO I FISHED WITH: This past Saturday morning, 26 September, I fished with father-and-son Paul and Parker Autry who drove in from near Georgetown, TX.

Parker just began Kindergarten at a private Christian school in the area, and Paul works for a company focused on providing construction software to aid in large, commercial construction efforts.

This whole fishing trip idea began back in late July when Paul’s wife, Morgan, got him a fishing trip gift certificate from her, Parker, and Parker’s little brother, Noble. 

 

 

PHOTO CAPTION #1:   Paul and Parker saved the best for last.  This 3.75 pound Stillhouse largemouth chased an MAL Lure about 8 feet off bottom in about 32 feet of water and the fight was on.  We broke out the landing net for this one to make sure it didn’t get away.

 

 

  PHOTO CAPTION #2:   Downrigging before the fog developed contributed these nice white bass to the tally.  

WHERE WE FISHED: Stillhouse Hollow

WHEN WE FISHED:  Saturday morning, 26 September 2020

HOW WE FISHED:  Well the weather threw us a curveball this morning … fog — a persistent fog.  As I arrived at the launch around 6:15A, everything was looking good.  The air was 64F, stars were shining, and (as you can see from the weather forecast pasted in below), we were due for some more southerly winds which began yesterday, and at a good velocity.

We got to the first area I intended to fish, got lines in the water, and, as it got brighter the fish began to respond.  We were on our third white bass of the morning — the first fish Parker had ever encountered — and a very dense fog began to develop.  The combination of humidity and temperature were such that we were now caught in a ground-level cloud. The fishing died where we were, and relocation to 3 other areas also did us no good. 

Whenever I have kids aboard I always bring my sunfish gear, and this morning was no exception.  So, while we waited for conditions to improve on the open water bite, we fished shallow, recently flooded cover for sunfish, and did well. Sunfishing requires hand and eyes be constantly engaged, so it is a good fit for elementary-aged kids.  Parker managed 18 sunfish — a combination of bluegill, greens, and longears — as we fished two areas prior to the fog lifting at around 9:30A.

I got back out into open water to search for white bass, finding a few more in our final hour via downriggers.   Just about the time young Parker was requiring lunch, we brought the ‘riggers in, snapped a few photos of our white bass, and then released them. 

As we released our fish, I noted an abundance of other fish showed on the bottom beneath the boat as our released fish swam downwards (as seen on sonar).  We quickly grabbed the spinning rods rigged with MAL Lures and, in seconds, were fast to a nice largemouth bass which would be our largest fish of the morning.

TALLY: 34 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS:  Temperature profile indicating the thermocline is breaking down…

 

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES: 

Start Time:  6:45A

End Time: 11:30A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 64F

Elevation:  3.27′ high with a 0.01′ 24-hour drop and 1 CFS flow thru the dam

Water Surface Temp: 75.5F

Wind Speed & Direction:  Calm during the foggy period through, 9:30A, then ramping up quickly to SSW13.

Sky Condition: Fog began to form around 7A and persisted until around 9:30A, giving way to 100% grey skies.

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous with 74% illumination GT = 40

Wx SNAPSHOT:

   

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 039-1102 – downrigging for whites until fog developed and killed the bite

**Area Sh0043 and 239 – shallow sunfish

**Area vic 790 – downrigging/vertical MAL Lure work  

 

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

WHO I FISHED WITH: This afternoon, Friday, 25 September, I returned to the water after a few days off due to foul weather early in the week, and a string of sonar training sessions thereafter.

I fished Belton for the first time in quite a while, mainly because I had two youngsters, ages 5 and 6, aboard, and the water level being closer to normal at Belton meant that sunfish would not be dispersed into flooded brush as is the case over on Stillhouse, which is 3+ feet high now.

I fished with Alberto Bursian and his 5-year-old son, Tiago, and with Alberto’s friend, Greg Crisp, and his son, 6-year-old Brigs.    

PHOTO CAPTION #1:   This “bottom-hugging” scenario in warm water just screams for a vertical method using the MAL Lure.  Fish were blanketing the bottom over a ~40 yard stretch and were ready to feed.  Each one of those blue, oval-shaped dots holding just off bottom is a white bass.

 

PHOTO CAPTION #2:  Alberto and Tiago Bursian, left, and Greg and Brigs Crisp.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

WHEN WE FISHED:  Friday afternoon, 25 September 2020

HOW WE FISHED: Thanks to a returning southerly wind, the fishing was pretty easy this afternoon.  We got on our first bunch of fish just minutes after launching at 4P, and stayed on them for a full 2.5 hours.  We alternated between vertical work with white MAL Lures and chartreuse MAL Lures and horizontal work with 3-armed umbrella rigs equipped with Pet Spoons.  The vertical bite was better earlier on, then faded.  The MAL’s definitely took better fish.  Many of the fish we took on the downriggers were smallish.  By the time 6:30P rolled around, we’d boated 84 fish and the bite was waning in this general location.

We moved on and changed up our approach in order to target sunfish up in shallow water.  In about 30 minutes’ time we put 26 sunfish in the boat using live bait under floats in under 4 feet of water.  Our catch consisted of bluegill, green, redear, and longear sunfish.

From 7PM to 7:40PM we took one last shot at the white bass.  I’d hoped to find another bottom-hugging school which would be susceptible to vertical tactics, as the boys, despite their young age, were doing well with the retrieve cadence needed to provoke fish to bite, thanks to hands-on coaching and encouragement by their fathers.

We did pick up a final 9 white bass, but all via downrigging.  We wrapped up right at 7:45 with exactly 119 fish boated.

TALLY: 119 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS:  TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES: 

Start Time:  4:00P

End Time: 7:45P

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 84F

Elevation:  0.64′ high with a 0.03′ 24-hour rise and 17 CFS flow thru the dam

Water Surface Temp: 79.6F

Wind Speed & Direction:  SE6-7 Sky Condition: Blue skies with <5% white, high cloud cover

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous with 66% illumination

GT = 5

Wx SNAPSHOT:     

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1024 for early white bass both vertically and horizontally, 84 fish

**Area 185 – 26 shallow sunfish

**Area 1921 – a final 9 low-light white bass on downriggers

 

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

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, September 17th, 2020, I fished with Robert Hughes from near Lubbock, TX, accompanied by his grandson, Nathan Elliott, who lives in Gatesville and works in Harker Heights.

Robert, age 74, retired from the janitorial supply business, and Nathan is a professional firefighter employed by the City of Harker Heights, working out of the firehouse on FM3481, near Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir. Nathan coordinated this trip for his grandparents as part of their 57th wedding anniversary during which they drove down to see him.   

PHOTO CAPTION #1:  Nathan Elliott and his grandfather, 74-year-old Robert Hughes, shared a day on the water in pursuit of white bass.  Downrigging with Pet Spoons and vertical work with MAL Lures put 73 fish in the boat today.

 

WHERE WE FISHED: Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir

HOW WE FISHED:  After getting off a plane inbound from Alaska in the wee hours on Wednesday morning, I slept briefly, then got right out on the water to scout in advance of this trip, as I’d not fished locally since Labor Day Monday and there had been a lot of environmental change since that time (6′ elevation increase, a cold front, and atypical, extended periods of NE winds).  

I opted to invest my scouting efforts on Stillhouse for several reasons: 1) the Corps is releasing water from Lake Belton (a negative factor), 2) the release rate at Lake Belton led me to believe the gates would shut soon, thus introducing another negative variable to an already tough scenario, 3) I got below average reports from those fishing both Belton and Stillhouse while I was away, and 4) my 30+ years of record-keeping indicate that, in a tough scenario, Stillhouse typically outperforms Belton.

The scouting went well.  My goal was to catch 3 fish at a given area and then move on to check additional areas, and, in so doing, I found 4 fish-holding areas which we could fish today.

When all was said and done, we put this morning’s trip together on just 2 of those 4 scouted areas.  Today’s conditions were a bit better than during my scouting efforts yesterday, in that we had both a steady, manageable wind (vs. calm yesterday), and light cloud cover (vs. clear skies yesterday).

We met up at 6:45A, had lines in the water around 7:05A, caught fish via downrigging for 2 solid hours before the suspended, scattered schools of white bass we were targeting dispersed. We landed 33 fish during this time using Pet Spoons on 3-armed umbrella rigs.

We next looked at an area I scouted yesterday (but found nothing present at that time); I did this because the wind was blowing into the area leading me to believe it could have turned on overnight.  It did not.

So, we moved on to a third area I scouted with good results yesterday.  We found fish very active there from 9:20 until around 10:20.   Sonar was quite active with both balled up shad and gamefish as I idled around, so, we began to put downriggers down.  No sooner did Nathan get his set to depth then it went off.  When I saw the aggression level of these fish, I directed Robert to unrig his downrigger, and to send an MAL Lure plummeting for the bottom instead.

Long story short, we sat on a large, moderately aggressive school of white bass for a full hour and pulled another 43 fish without moving the boat, all on chartreuse MAL Lures.  I like the chartreuse whenever there is cloud cover, whereas the white and chartreuse fish equally well under clear, sunny skies.  

Fortunately, both fellows quickly got the hang of timing their presentation of the MAL Lure to the passing of the fish beneath the boat via the use of Garmin LiveScope, doing this just as you would “lead” a bird when shooting a shotgun.  The rest was history.

By 10:20, the wind was quickly coming out of the fishes’ sails, and, after spending our final 15 minutes downrigging and failing to add even a single fish to the tally, we called it a good day and headed back to the dock.

TALLY: 73 fish caught and released (71 white bass, 1 freshwater drum, and 1 largemouth bass)

OBSERVATIONS:   No water has been released from Stillhouse since the recent rains, thus allowing 6+ feet of new water to accumulate, whereas Belton had a flow of 1,645 cfs  this morning and was slowly falling as a result.  During the day (Thursday, 17 Sep.), the COE reduced the flow from Belton to 51 CFS — yet another negative factor I’m glad we avoided).  

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES: 

Start Time:  6:40A

End Time: 11:00A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 75F

Elevation:  3.14′ high, +0.02′ 24-hour change, 1 CFS flow (up over 6 feet after ~4.50″ began fell on Wednesday – Friday, 02-03 Sep., followed by another 1.25″ on 10 Sep.)

Water Surface Temp:  81.2F

Wind Speed & Direction: NNE11 all morning

Sky Condition: 80-90% grey cloud cover

Moon Phase: New moon today

GT =35

Wx SNAPSHOT:   

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area vic 1133 to 482 –  downrigging with Pet Spoons on 3-armed umbrella rigs for 33 fish in 2+ hours.

**Area vic SH0033G –  MAL Lures worked vertically in 35′ to the shallow side of this area for 40 fish in ~ 1 hour

 

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

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, September 5th, 2020, I fished with Killeen native Keith Carroll and his 5-year-old son, Andrew.

Keith, an Ellison High School graduate, now lives with his wife in Cedar Park, TX, where he makes his living as a graphic artist working in the clothing industry with a firm based in San Marcos, TX.

Since many of you who follow my blog/Facebook page are local, I’ll mention that Keith’s mom, Barbara Carroll was a foreign language and TAG program teacher at Ellison H.S. ‘back in the day’.

Although Andrew has been fishing before, he’d never been on a boat before, but, it seemed no big deal for him as we cruised around 30 mph toward our first fishing area as we awaited sunrise.

PHOTO CAPTION #1:  Keith Carroll and his 5-year-old son wound up with 55 fish this morning on a day I thought would have been tougher than it was thanks to 3.5+ feet of flood water coming into this ~6.400 acre reservoir. WHERE WE FISHED: Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir

HOW WE FISHED:  I really was not sure exactly what to expect today.  We had a number of negative factors working against us, namely the NE wind, and 3.5 feet of new water brought in by 3 days of rain which dropped about 3.5 to 5.5 inches throughout the Leon and Lampasas River watersheds.

So, we just got out there and fished!  We looked for natural signs of fish activity and we used sonar and wound up piecing together a pretty solid trip. The fish definitely got more active in the last 2 hours than they were in the first two hours.  The first two hours of the trip saw cloud-darkened skies and lighter winds, whereas the winds picked up (although still from the ENE) and the skies brightened to “squinting intensity” in the last two hours. We alternated between fishing for white bass and sunfish as Andrew’s interest level and attention span dictated. 

As we fished for white bass, we encountered 3 instances where the fish were sufficiently congregated to allow for vertical work with the MAL Lure, otherwise, we had to downrig for them.

The sunfishing definitely got easier with all of the flooded vegetation now standing in the 1/2 foot of floodwater versus trying to access them in the matted hydrilla which existed while the lake was nearly 3′ low earlier in the week.  We went after ’em with lightweight floats, small hooks, small splitshot, and small baits presented with a bream pole.

In our first round of white bass fishing, we landed 13 white bass and 1 largemouth.  During our first round of sunfishing, we landed 13 sunfish.  We switched back over to white bass and landed another 22 white bass, then finished up fishing shallow for sunfish, putting a final 6 bluegill in the boat.

TALLY: 55 fish caught and released (35 white bass, 19 sunfish, 1 largemouth bass)

OBSERVATIONS:   Fishing was not nearly as negatively impacted as I suspected it might be with 3.51 feet of fresh floodwater coming in over a 3-day period.

Temperature Profile:

0 feet 82.6F

5 feet 83.3F

10 feet 83.6F

15 feet 83.6F

20 feet 83.6F

25 feet 83.6F

30 feet 83.1F

35 feet 80.9F

40 feet 77.4F

45 feet 75.7F

50 feet 74.8F

55 feet 73.9F

60 feet 65.5F

65 feet 61.9F

 

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES: 

Start Time:  6:40A

End Time: 10:50A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 73F

Elevation:  0.55′ high, +1.18′ 24-hour change, 1 CFS flow (up 3.51 feet after ~4.50″ began fell on Wednesday – Friday)

Water Surface Temp:  81.9F

Wind Speed & Direction: ENE6 at obscured sunrise, increasing to ENE9 by trip’s end

Moon Phase: Waning gibbous with 90% illumination (full moon +2 days )

GT = 0

 

Wx SNAPSHOT:  N/A  

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1395-041 – early downrigging for whites

**Area 914-1102 – early downrigging for whites with 1 round of MAL Lures worked vertically

**Area Sh0121C – sunfish

**Area 671-1447 – late downrigging for whites with 2 rounds of MAL Lures worked vertically

**Area 189 – 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