WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Friday, November 3, I invited longtime friend, Jerry Worley of Harker Heights aboard, along with his son-in-law, Nolan Beede, to accompany me on a scouting trip on a Lake Belton.
Thanks to a great amount of environmental change in a very short period of time, the fishes’ locations changed substantially versus where I last made contact with them last Wednesday afternoon.
I have found through the years that a little time invested in scouting will pay great dividends over the following span of time during which we enjoy more stable weather.
Here is how the fishing went.…
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Next available dates are Nov. 14, 15
PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Nolan Beede and Jerry Worley joined me for a successful scouting trip to locate fish once again after recent heavy rains and a cold snap moved them from their previous locations.
Find the Bladed Hazy Eye Slab here: https://whitebasstools.com/
WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton
WHEN WE FISHED: Friday, 03 November 2023
HOW WE FISHED:
The plan today was to do a lot of looking in the Cowhouse Creek arm, the main basin, and the Leon River arm of Lake Belton to figure out where the fish relocated to following the addition of almost 4 feet of water in a very short span of time, accompanied by a 7° water temperature drop during that same span of time.
By the time we wrapped up, I had determined that the fish have now moved shallower, that birds are now present, and that the thermocline has completely disappeared thus leading to fish holding exclusively on bottom.
In my last trip prior to all of this change, I was locating fish between 35 and 40 feet deep. Today, all of the fish we caught came between 25 and 32 feet of water. Our approach was to use sonar to find fish, then limit our catch to about 10-15 fish per area, leave those fish while still biting, and go find additional fish while the morning’s feeding window remained open.
In all, we were able to find fish at 13 locations, and 9 of these produced fish. Again, due to the rapid cool down, I defaulted to the white, 5/8 ounce Bladed Hazy Eye Slab, andcontinued using that as the fish we caught regurgitated shad of that same size as well as shad both larger and smaller.
At each of the locations where we found fish, a smoking retrieve with a default of seven handle turns upwards off the bottom did the trick to draw the fish we initially found, and, once those fish got excited, they began to draw in additional fish. Despite seeing roughly 100 birds on the main lake right around sunrise this morning, we did not follow any bird action to fish, nor did we see any to follow, although I am sure that time is not very far off.
Our tally for the morning was 106 fish which included three hybrid striped bass, one largemouth, bass, six freshwater drum, and 96 white bass.
TALLY: 106 fish caught and released.
OBSERVATIONS: 1) ~120 birds present in open water, but no fish found as a result yet. 2) Water temperature profile measured 7:40AM, Friday, 03 November. At long last, the thermocline has disappeared…
0 feet, 64.9F
5 feet, 66.1F
10 feet, 66.4F
15 feet, 66.4F
20 feet, 66.4F
25 feet, 66.4F
30 feet, 66.4F
35 feet, 66.4F
40 feet, 66.4F
45 feet, 66.4F
50 feet, 66.3F
55 feet, 66.3F
60 feet, 65.6F
WEATHER DATA:
Start Time: 7:40A
End Time: 12:30P
Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 46F
Elevation: 15.44 feet low, 47 CFS flow
Water Surface Temp: 64.9F on the surface.
Wind Speed & Direction: SSE6 at trip’s start, building to SSE12 by trip’s end
Sky Condition: 20% white cloud cover on a blue sky, building to 30% by trip’s end
Moon Phase: Waning gibbous moon at 68% illumination.
GT = N/A
Wx SNAPSHOT:
AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:
Areas:
B0171G – 3 fish
150 – 11 fish
B0009C – 17 fish
B0011C – 12 fish
B0016C – 10 fish
B0242G – 11 fish
1555 – 7 fish
1151/301 – 13 fish
B0196C/B0196G – 22 fish
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
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