August | 2024 | Fishing Report

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

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Trading Places — 147 Fish

August 26th, 2024 by Bob Maindelle

CLIENTS: This morning I welcomed aboard Amanda Adams and her sons, Carsen (16) and Carter (14) from Eugene, Oregon, which is in the southwestern part of the state. Amanda’s brother-in-law, T.J. Yagalla, a client of mine, scheduled the trip for her. As his text came in, my wife and I were actually in Eugene wrapping up a week’s vacation taking in the giant Northern California coastal redwood trees and doing some rockfish fishing off the coast near Crescent City, CA. Having experienced both places now, I’d much rather be in Oregon in August!!

DATE: Monday, 26 August 2024 (AM)

NEXT OPEN DATES: 28 Aug. (AM), 10-12 Sep.

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Amanda, Carsen, and Carter Adams with a few of the 147 fish they caught using a variety of tactics and baits on this late August morning fishing trip on Lake Belton.

PHOTO CAPTION: While “triples” (catching three fish at a time using a 3-armed umbrella rig) do happen while downrigging in the summer months, this crew landed five sets of triples today!!

PHOTO CAPTION: Carsen landed our single largest fish of the trip. This smallmouth buffalo hit his MAL Mini inline spinner as he was working it vertically through a school of white bass. It weighed 10.50 pounds on a certified scale.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

SUMMARY OF HOW WE FISHED:

We began the morning downrigging under low-light conditions. Fish were fairly active by 6:50A, then continued to feed more and more enthusiastically until about 25 minutes after the sun began to shine directly on the water. During this time we used #12 Pet Spoons behind 3-armed umbrella rigs to catch mature white bass in under 20 feet of water. Fish were quite willing to come as much as 7-8 feet off bottom to chase these lures.

During this low-light period, we encountered one instance with several hundred fish showing out to starboard, so, I stopped the downrigging, Spot-Locked, and got everyone quickly tossing MAL Originals with chartreuse tails to those fish, and retrieving with a sawtooth method. This quickly added 11 fish to our count before these fish dissipated.

We returned to downrigging until the fish moved deeper than 20 feet and no longer showed an interest in rising off bottom, nor in chasing lures enthusiastically. The sun had now been shining on the water for about a half-hour.

At this point, I used side-imaging and down-imaging to find less active fish grouped together on bottom. Once found, I Spot-Locked on them and, with the help of Garmin LiveScope had everyone use MAL Minis with a vertical smoking tactic to tease these fish into chasing these baits upwards. The splasher was invaluable for drawing fish in from the surrounding area.

The rest of the morning was spent finding fish, Spot-Locking atop them, and working MAL Minis vertically while being aided by both LiveScope and the splasher.

Here is a tutorial on vertically smoking the MAL Lure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDSvfXgrAUE

Here is a tutorial on horizontally “sawtoothing” with the MAL Lure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IC3FMEQHOMQ

LURES USED SUCCESSFULLY ON THIS TRIP: We downrigged as long as we were finding fish on clean bottoms with #12 Pet Spoons, stopped once to then “smoked” MAL Minis and Originals for the latter portion of the trip, once the fish got lazy and pushed lower in the water column. Find all MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

TALLY: 147 fish caught and released, including 3 drum, 1 largemouth bass, and a 60/40 mix of 143 short and keeper white bass.

OBSERVATIONS:

1) Only brief (lasting just seconds) topwater action observed, primarily just prior to sunrise.

2) Best quality fish came in the first 80 minutes; mainly smaller fish after ~8:30A.

LATEST WATER TEMPERATURE PROFILE:

Here was the water temperature profile for Lake Belton, measured with a FishHawk TD device around 6:25 AM on Monday, August 26 …

0 feet 87.2F

5 feet 87.6F

10 feet 87.9F

15 feet 87.9F

20 feet 87.9F

25 feet 87.9F

30 feet 87.2F

35 feet 85.6F

40 feet 84.2F

45 feet 83.3F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:35A

End Time: 10:50A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 74F

Elevation: 0.60′ low and falling slowly with a 52 cfs flow; .04′ fall in last 24 hours

Water Surface Temp: 88.2F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: Light and variable all morning

Sky Condition: 25% white cloud cover on a light blue sky at start, increasing to 40% by trip’s end

Moon Phase: Last quarter moon at 49% illumination.

GT = 55

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Area 2037 to 165 to B0293G – 62 fish on downriggers & Pets, with one stop for sawtoothing w/ MALs

Area vic 2037 – 16 fish on smoked MAL Minis

Area vic 565- 22 fish on smoked MAL Minis

Area vic B0290G – 12 fish on smoked MAL Minis

Area vic 826 – 35 fish on smoked MAL Minis

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)

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

That School Bell Has Yet to Ring in Cairo — 101 Fish

August 16th, 2024August 16th, 2024 by Bob Maindelle

CLIENTS: This Friday morning I fished with returning guests — the grandfather-grandson team of Charles Simmons and Caden Kimpel. Charles resides in Salado, and Caden, whose dad works in the international petroleum industry, currently resides in Cairo, Egypt. He won’t start school until early September, so, we got to enjoy a very uncrowded Lake Belton this morning.

DATE: Friday, 16 August 2024 (AM)

NEXT OPEN DATES: 26-30Aug. (AM & PM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Nine-year-old Caden Kimpel and his grandfather, Charles Simmons, landed 101 fish on an unbusy Lake Belton using a combination of tactics between first light and 10:30AM.

PHOTO CAPTION: Triple!! Caden landed these three “keeper” white bass simultaneously on his 3-armed umbrella rig equipped with #12 Pet Spoons which did a great job imitating the smallest shad in the system right now.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

SUMMARY OF HOW WE FISHED: Fishing was pretty straightforward this morning. With high pressure firmly in control of the weather, a light southerly breeze, and no boat traffic, the fish were ready to feed come first light, and stayed feeding for just shy of four hours.

We started the morning downrigging just to have baits in the water as I covered water with sonar to search for fishable concentrations of fish. After finding fish, we quickly discovered they much preferred a horizontal presentation to a vertical one, so, we kept right on downrigging as long as the fish cooperated. This accounted for 44 fish coming in as singles, doubles, and triples, all on #12 Pet Spoons behind 3-armed umbrella rigs.

Once this area quieted down, I found our next batch of fish in some timber, so, we smoked and cast MAL Originals through “lanes” in the timber working them sawtooth-style, as downrigging was not an option. There was a bit of a learning curve to this, but, Charles and Caden added 8 more fish to the count before these fish lost interest.

By now, it was hot and bright and outside the “low-light” window which has produced quality fish both AM and PM. We mostly smallish fish from this point forward, but, they were quite cooperative, responded well to the splasher, and provided lots of action. These fish were taken by smoking MAL Minis vertically using Garmin LiveScope to gauge fish response. Bending the shaft about 15-20 degrees on these tiny spinners which imitate young-of-the-year shad is a great “tackle tip” if they don’t spin easily out of the package.

The trick on the “smoking” tactic in the summer, regardless of which MAL you choose, is getting the spinner going as close to the bottom as possible, and keeping the retrieve speed down thereafter. Hence, I use 5.2:1 gear ratio reels for my clients.

Here is a tutorial on smoking the MAL Lure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDSvfXgrAUE

LURES USED SUCCESSFULLY ON THIS TRIP: We downrigged as long as we were finding fish on clean bottoms with #12 Pet Spoons, then “smoked” MAL Minis and Originals for the latter portion of the trip, once the fish got lazy and pushed lower in the water column. Find all MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

TALLY: 101 fish caught and released, including 5 drum, 1 largemouth bass, and a 60/40 mix of short and keeper white bass.

OBSERVATIONS:

1) No topwater action observed.

2) Mainly undersized fish after ~8:30A.

LATEST WATER TEMPERATURE PROFILE:

Here was the water temperature profile for Lake Belton, measured with a FishHawk TD device around 6 AM on Friday, August 16 …

0 feet 88.2F

5 feet 88.6F

10 feet 88.8F

15 feet 88.8F

20 feet 88.5F

25 feet 87.9F

30 feet 86.7F

35 feet 85.5F

40 feet 84.8F

45 feet 83.8F

50 feet 82.1F

55 feet 80.5F

60 feet 79.7F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:20A

End Time: 10:30A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 79F

Elevation: 0.24′ low and falling slowly with a 33 cfs flow; .04′ fall in last 24 hours

Water Surface Temp: 88.2F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: S8 all morning

Sky Condition: 25% white cloud cover on a light blue sky

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous moon at 86% illumination.

GT = 65

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Area 1126 thru B0170C – 44 fish on downriggers

Area B0170C – 8 white bass on sawtoothed & smoked MAL Original

Area vic 565 – 49 fish on smoked MAL Minis

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)

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Cherry Pickin’ with Cowboys — 105 Fish

August 15th, 2024 by Bob Maindelle

CLIENTS: This past Wednesday evening I fished with returning guest Dustin Marsh, a large animal veterinarian based in the Bryan/College Station area who specializes in dairy herd care. Coming with Dustin for the first time aboard my boat was James Becker who makes a living doing all things cattle, including international export.

Based on my observations over the past few weeks, I knew fishing for quality fish was not going to really kick in until after 6:30, so, we met up and “cherry picked” fished in just the final two hours before dark.

DATE: Wednesday, 14 August 2024 (PM)

NEXT OPEN DATES: 15 & 26-30Aug. (AM & PM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: James Becker and Dustin Marsh with a few of the 105 fish they picked off using Garmin LiveScope and MAL Originals “smoked” vertically on Lake Belton.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

SUMMARY OF HOW WE FISHED: With just two hours to make it happen, I went with a “high percentage” option as far as fish location was concerned, and that turned out well. We essentially drove right to the fish, Spot-Locked atop of them in ~26 feet of water and landed 63 until the dimming light pushed the fish shallower. We bumped up into 20′, Spot-Locked again, and finished out the trip on this second anchorage, taking our tally up to 105 fish, all caught and released. The only tactic necessary was “smoking” vertically with the MAL Original. This was certainly enhanced by Garmin LiveScope, but that technology was only icing on the cake.

Here is a tutorial on smoking the MAL Lure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDSvfXgrAUE

LURES USED SUCCESSFULLY ON THIS TRIP: We “smoked” MAL Originals vertically for the entire evening to wear out the keeper white bass. Find all MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

TALLY: 105 fish caught and released, including 2 drum, 1 largemouth bass, 5 short white bass, and 97 legal white bass with several exceeding 14″.

OBSERVATIONS:

1) As we hit 8:10P and the fish began to slow down, we found that targeting the highest fish in the water column from any given school outproduced just randomly reeling up through a school of fish.

2) Nothing but undersized fish at several areas through 7P, then quality fish thereafter; this is just the opposite of what I’m seeing in the mornings.

LATEST WATER TEMPERATURE PROFILE:

Here was the water temperature profile for Lake Belton, measured with a FishHawk TD device around 5:50 AM on Friday, August 9 …

0 feet 87.6F

5 feet 88.2F

10 feet 88.5F

15 feet 87.2F

20 feet 86.2F

25 feet 85.6F

30 feet 85.3F

35 feet 85.0F

40 feet 84.5F

45 feet 83.7F

50 feet 81.9F

55 feet 80.7F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:35P

End Time: 8:35P

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 100F

Elevation: 0.2′ low and falling slowly with a 33 cfs flow; .04′ fall in last 24 hours

Water Surface Temp: 88.9F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: S10 all evening

Sky Condition: 25% white cloud cover on a slightly hazy blue sky

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous moon at 68% illumination.

GT = 50

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Area vic 164 – 63 fish on smoked MAL Originals

Area vic 2037 – 42 fish on smoked MAL Originals

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)

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Caught ’em Until His Hands Hurt — 118 Fish

August 15th, 2024 by Bob Maindelle

CLIENTS: This past Tuesday evening I fished with returning guests — the father-and-son team of Oscar and Mateo Santiago. Although many school districts got the 2024-2025 year kicked off today, Mateo didn’t head back until the following day, so, he and dad got in one last adventure together before the academic routine kicks in.

The fishing was so good that, after landing his share of the 118 fish they landed, Mateo told his dad that his hands hurt. I suggested Mateo get a note for the first day of school letting the teacher know he would be physically unable to complete written assignments for a few days.

DATE: Tuesday, 13 August 2024 (PM)

NEXT OPEN DATES: 15 & 26-30Aug. (AM & PM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Oscar and Mateo Santiago with large, well-proportioned Lake Belton white bass taken between 7P and dark on MAL Original Lures with chartreuse tails. The father-and-son team landed 118 fish.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

SUMMARY OF HOW WE FISHED: That 6:45P to 7P timeframe very consistently sees a real upshift in fish feeding behavior under this present high-pressure weather system. Prior to that time, I’m finding only small fish which respond well, albeit briefly, to the splasher. We managed to catch a few by smoking MAL Minis up through them, then they either leave, or grow used to the presence of the lures and turn off to them.

Then, around 6:45 to 7P, as the light level begins to drop and the air temperature begins to decrease, I’m finding much better quality fish consistently using the bottom in 16-24 feet of water (deeper earlier, moving shallower as sunset and dark approach). These fish also respond well to the splasher and stick around for long whiles allowing for high catch numbers. My best approach for these has been “smoking” the MAL Original with chartreuse tail up off bottom for 5-6 cranks. These fish seem unwilling to travel any further upwards than the 10 feet level beneath the surface, so, bringing the lure any higher is just wasted effort. Garmin LiveScope clearly illustrates this over and over again.

LURES USED SUCCESSFULLY ON THIS TRIP: We “smoked” MAL Minis vertically until 7P for smaller fish, then used MAL Originals vertically for the remainder of the evening to wear out the keeper white bass. Find all MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

TALLY: 118 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS:

1) As we hit 8:10P and the fish began to slow down, we found that targeting the highest fish in the water column from any given school outproduced just randomly reeling up through a school of fish.

2) Nothing but undersized fish at several areas through 7P, then quality fish thereafter; this is just the opposite of what I’m seeing in the mornings.

LATEST WATER TEMPERATURE PROFILE:

Here was the water temperature profile for Lake Belton, measured with a FishHawk TD device around 5:50 AM on Friday, August 9 …

0 feet 87.6F

5 feet 88.2F

10 feet 88.5F

15 feet 87.2F

20 feet 86.2F

25 feet 85.6F

30 feet 85.3F

35 feet 85.0F

40 feet 84.5F

45 feet 83.7F

50 feet 81.9F

55 feet 80.7F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 5:40P

End Time: 8:40P

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 100F

Elevation: 0.13′ low and falling slowly with a 33 cfs flow

Water Surface Temp: 88.9F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: S9 all evening

Sky Condition: 25% white cloud cover on a slightly hazy blue sky

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous moon at 59% illumination.

GT = 20

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Area 0142 – 7 short whites on smoked MAL Minis

Area vic B0238G – 4 short whites on smoked MAL Minis

Area 1822 – 107 white bass on smoked MAL Originals

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)

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Squeezing Every Last Drop Out of Summer Break — 157 Fish

August 13th, 2024August 13th, 2024 by Bob Maindelle

CLIENTS: On Tuesday morning I fished with returning guest A.J. Shiller, accompanied by his sons, and my first-time guests, Easton (9) and Colson (5). A.J. and I agreed a kids-only package would be just right, hence, our focus was on keeping fish coming over the side of the boat and on variety to keep the kids engaged.

DATE: Tuesday, 13 August 2024 (AM)

NEXT OPEN DATES: 14 & 15 Aug. (AM & PM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Colson (5), A.J., and Easton (9) Shiller on their last “big event” of the summer as the Salado Independent School District kicks off the 2024-2025 academic year tomorrow. The boys landed 157 fish on Lake Belton.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

SUMMARY OF HOW WE FISHED: A.J. and I agreed that, given the kids’ ages, keeping the fish coming over the side of the boat was Priority #1. So, if whatever we were doing slowed down, we moved on to the next thing.

We started the morning downrigging successfully under low-light conditions, but quickly transitioned to sight-casting for topwater fish until that ended abruptly at sunrise. We then began downrigging again, but only for a short while, taking our total to 20 fish.

We then moved up shallow into flooded brush and proceeded to wear out the panfish, with the boys landing a variety of 54 fish on bait presented under floats. When that began to taper off, we headed out for yet another adventure.

By this time, the sun had been directly shining on the water for quite some time, thus getting the algae blooming, which, in turn brought shad near the surface, with white bass in hot pursuit. We began downrigging for these fish and landed a single, a double, and a triple, before the action exploded on the surface, thus revealing an area the fish and bait were using heavily. We brought the fish under the boat with the splasher and the boys worked MAL Minis smoked right up off the bottom to add a final 77 fish to the count, most of which were smallish, ending the morning at 157 fish as this late morning bite began to wane.

LURES USED SUCCESSFULLY ON THIS TRIP: We downrigged with 3-armed umbrella rigs equipped with #12 Pet Spoons for white bass, we “smoked” MAL Minis & MAL Originals vertically and we sawtoothed with both horizontally. Find three-armed umbrella rigs and MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

TALLY: 157 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS:

1) First solid, sustained topwater morning action since Aug. 4 witnessed this morning.

LATEST WATER TEMPERATURE PROFILE:

Here was the water temperature profile for Lake Belton, measured with a FishHawk TD device around 5:50 AM on Friday, August 9 …

0 feet 87.6F

5 feet 88.2F

10 feet 88.5F

15 feet 87.2F

20 feet 86.2F

25 feet 85.6F

30 feet 85.3F

35 feet 85.0F

40 feet 84.5F

45 feet 83.7F

50 feet 81.9F

55 feet 80.7F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:30A

End Time: 10A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 77F

Elevation: 0.14′ low and falling slowly with a 33 cfs flow. 0.04′ drop over the last 24-hours

Water Surface Temp: 88.4F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: SSE7-9

Sky Condition: 25% white cloud cover with a noticeable haze

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous moon at 59% illumination.

GT = 35

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Area vic 027 thru 813 — 20 fish w/downrigging transitioning to sight-casting, then back to downrigging either side of sunrise

Area B0289G – 54 sunfish in shallow brush on bait under floats

Area Vic 1581 – downrigging transitioning to an excellent vertical smoking bite under the splasher for 83 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)

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Do You Realize Class Starts in 12 Hours? — 122 Fish

August 13th, 2024 by Bob Maindelle

CLIENTS: This evening I fished with returning guests Wes & Knox Stearns and Rudy & Jaxen Yepez. If those names sound familiar it is because Wes & Knox have been aboard three times now in the past three weeks, and Rudy & Jaxen joined then just last Wednesday evening. Each time, the plan was to get in just one more fishing trip before school. As we returned to the boat ramp after a successful evening, the boys were due to be seated in their classes in under 12 hours’ time!

DATE: Monday, 12 August 2024 (PM)

NEXT OPEN DATES: 14 & 15 Aug. (AM & PM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Wes & Knox Stearns and Jaxen and Rudy Yepez on the occasion of the boys’ third and final “back to school” fishing trip. The boys landed 122 fish in about three hours’ time on Lake Belton.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

SUMMARY OF HOW WE FISHED: I planned to fish with the boys (only, as this was a Kids Fish, Too! trip just for them) for 3.5 hours. I baited out an area for catfish to provide a bit of variety, suspecting that the white bass fishing wouldn’t really kick in until about 2.5 to 3 hours before dark.

Well, we got one pulldown in 30 minutes on the catfish deal and left it behind.

We then began searching in the 22-28′ range for white bass. We looked over six areas, and found fish at five of them, but, all the fish we found were short fish — 39 consecutive short fish!! The boys took these on MAL Minis worked vertically with a smoking tactic, aided by Garmin LiveScope. I experimented with an MAL Original, but this was too large for these small fish, and, evidently all of the fish in these areas were small.

At just after 7P, we moved again. My intentions were to downrig over a large area while really paying attention to side-imaging to ferret out where fish might be. We did not have to do much ferreting, as we passed directly over what appeared to be sedentary fish. The boys both landed fish out of this school on the downriggers — a single and a triple — and they were all solid fish over 12.5″. I instructed them to leave the downrigger rods in, and we quickly U-turned, Spot-Locked on these fish, and fished them vertically (by smoking) and horizontally (by sawtoothing) with MAL Originals. This one stop gave up exactly 76 legal white bass through about 8:20.

As the sun set and the light failed, the fish moved shallower. We followed them until they finally quit around 8:40, adding a final 7 additional fish to the count for a final tally of 122 fish.

TALLY: 122 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS:

1) We had a SSE breeze at 8-9 with occasionally higher gusts. This created just enough chop to kill an evening topwater bite — we only saw one school blow up for all of 4 seconds.

2) Nothing but undersized fish at several areas through 7P, then quality fish thereafter; this is just the opposite of what I’m seeing in the mornings.

LATEST WATER TEMPERATURE PROFILE:

Here was the water temperature profile for Lake Belton, measured with a FishHawk TD device around 5:50 AM on Friday, August 9 …

0 feet 87.6F

5 feet 88.2F

10 feet 88.5F

15 feet 87.2F

20 feet 86.2F

25 feet 85.6F

30 feet 85.3F

35 feet 85.0F

40 feet 84.5F

45 feet 83.7F

50 feet 81.9F

55 feet 80.7F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 5:10P

End Time: 8:40P

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 100F

Elevation: 0.09′ low and falling slowly with a 33 cfs flow

Water Surface Temp: 88.9F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: S8 with gusts all evening

Sky Condition: 25% white cloud cover on a slightly hazy blue sky

Moon Phase: First quarter moon at 29% illumination.

GT = 35

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Area 1659 – 8 short whites on smoked MAL Minis

Area 0142 – 7 short whites on smoked MAL Minis

Area 1624 – 6 short whites and 1 drum on smoked MAL Minis

Area B0188C – 3 short whites on smoked MAL Minis

Area B0296C – 15 short whites on smoked MAL Minis

Area vic 165 – 83 white bass – 4 on downriggers, then 79 on smoked/sawtoothed MAL Originals

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)

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Last Hooks Before They Hit the Books — 117 Fish

August 12th, 2024 by Bob Maindelle

CLIENTS: This morning I fished with the Lee family for the first time. These folks had the patience of Job trying to get out fishing with me. Cold, windy weather foiled their springtime plans, then lake closure due to flooding forced yet another reschedule. Finally, on this, the last day of the kids’ summer vacation, it all came together for Dianne, Maggie (17), Cam (14), and Caden (11).

DATE: Monday, 12 August 2024 (AM)

NEXT OPEN DATES: 14 & 15 Aug. (AM & PM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Maggie, Caden, Cam, and Dianne Lee with a portion of their 117-fish catch on a 4-hour morning trip on Lake Belton.

PHOTO CAPTION: 93 of our 117 fish came on this MAL Mini worked straight up off bottom through fish consolidated under the boat by the splasher. It was a dead-ringer for the small shad the white bass were feeding on. Note: If you crank this and the blade doesn’t spin readily, just bend the wire shaft at a slight 10 or 15 degree angle to overcome that. The shaft in this photo has been bent so you can see the bend is very slight. Don’t overdo it!

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

SUMMARY OF HOW WE FISHED: There were four “chapters” in this morning’s story. First, we downrigged up shallow under low-light conditions. I didn’t find just a whole lot of fish, but the ones we found were eager to bite. We ended up with seven fish before the sun rose.

Chapter two: we went to an area I baited before sunrise and fished it with prepared baits under slipfloats. We gave it about 35 minutes and had only 1 channel cat caught, and 1 missed strike.

Chapter three: By 8:35, the sun was heating up the surface, algae was blooming, and shad were on the surface feeding, with white bass starting their “popcorn” feeding routine out in open water. I picked an area, downrigged it thoroughly and put another 16 fish in the boat until seeing even better, more consistent popcorn feeding about a half-mile away.

Chapter four: we headed to the vicinity of the topwater action, put the splasher to work, and were able to draw fish up under the boat for quite some time, allowing for a final 93 additional fish to be caught for a morning total of 117 fish landed in 3.75 hours by my 4-angler crew.

LURES USED SUCCESSFULLY ON THIS TRIP: We downrigged with 3-armed umbrella rigs equipped with #12 & 13 Pet Spoons for white bass, we “smoked” MAL Minis vertically, and we used prepared baits under floats for catfish. Find three-armed umbrella rigs and MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

TALLY: 117 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS:

1) The steady S7 wind made the morning quite bearable. Topwater “popcorn” action began to crop up around 8:30AM and helped me to know where to focus our open water downrigging and vertical fishing efforts.

LATEST WATER TEMPERATURE PROFILE:

Here was the water temperature profile for Lake Belton, measured with a FishHawk TD device around 5:50 AM on Friday, August 9 …

0 feet 87.6F

5 feet 88.2F

10 feet 88.5F

15 feet 87.2F

20 feet 86.2F

25 feet 85.6F

30 feet 85.3F

35 feet 85.0F

40 feet 84.5F

45 feet 83.7F

50 feet 81.9F

55 feet 80.7F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:30A

End Time: 10:20A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 77F

Elevation: 0.09′ low and falling slowly with a 33 cfs flow

Water Surface Temp: 87.2F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: S6-8 all morning

Sky Condition: Cloudless blue sky thru 9:15, then steadily increasing light grey cloud cover

Moon Phase: First quarter moon at 29% illumination.

GT = 20

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Area B0279G – downrigging for white bass w/ #12 Pet Spoons under low-light conditions – 7 white bass

Area B0295G – slipfloat fishing w/ prepared baits yielded only 1 channel cat

Area B0030G thru 676 – 15 white bass and 1 largemouth bass downrigging w/ #12 Pet Spoons

Area vic 1081 – smoking MAL Mini Lures for 93 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)

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

The Board Broke!! — 70 Fish

August 11th, 2024 by Bob Maindelle

CLIENTS: This past Friday morning I wrapped up the week welcoming aboard returning guests Paul Autry and his 9-year-old son, Parker. Joining me for the first time was Paul’s younger son, Nobel (age 7), and the boy’s maternal grandfather, Buck Buchanan. All live in the Round Rock area, north of Austin. This was one of many trips this year where lake closure forced us to reschedule after May/April rains inundated Lake Belton.

DATE: Friday, 09 August 2024 (AM)

NEXT OPEN DATES: 14 & 15 Aug. (AM & PM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Paul, Nobel, and Parker Autry, and the boys’ grandfather, Buck Buchanan with the best of the boys’ catch after 3.5 hours of effort on a hot, dry August morning on Belton Lake.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

SUMMARY OF HOW WE FISHED: With a pair of elementary-aged boys aboard, I planned ahead to offer a variety of tactic for a variety of species in order to keep the trip engaging. We started the morning off downrigging in shallow water under low-light conditions for what would be the best quality white bass of the trip. When that fishing played out as the sun’s direct rays began to strike the water, we headed into shallow cover and invested some time maneuvering in panfish out of the cover they were hiding in as we used floats and live bait to tempt them.

We closed out the trip spending the last 80 minutes downrigging in deeper, open water for white bass. These fish were smaller, but also incredibly abundant, routinely giving up doubles and triples as we precisely trolled 3-armed umbrella rigs equipped with #12 Pet Spoons behind downriggers right above schools of fish as they were revealed on down-imaging and on traditional 2-D sonar.

Just as things were beginning to click on this final downrigging effort, and after we’d already eliminated unproductive water and knew just where to concentrate, I had a printed circuit board go bad on one of my two downriggers. Not to worry! We just used the manual clutch to let the baits down to depth and good old elbow grease to haul the weight up by hand from 20-30 feet each time we had that starboard side rod go off. I hadn’t planned on an upper-body work out this morning, but, I got on anyway!

Paul and Buck were excellent mates, getting and keeping the rods rigged and maximizing the time the lures spent in the water, thus accounting for a great result for the boys. They even took the boys’ fish off for me.

LURES USED SUCCESSFULLY ON THIS TRIP: We downrigged with 3-armed umbrella rigs equipped with #12 & 13 Pet Spoons for white bass, and we used live bait under floats with telescoping bream rods to fish for panfish up shallow. Find three-armed umbrella rigs here: https://whitebasstools.com/

TALLY: 70 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS:

1) Winds were light from the SSE until around 9:15 when cloud cover began to build in from the E, and the winds went ESE6. This was on the lead edge of a mild front which moved in later in the afternoon bringing some rain to some parts of Bell, Coryell, and Lampasas counties. As the wind shift occurred, a noticeable increase in “popcorn” schooling by white bass pinning shad to the surface occurred.

LATEST WATER TEMPERATURE PROFILE:

Here was the water temperature profile for Lake Belton, measured with a FishHawk TD device around 5:50 AM on Friday, August 9 …

0 feet 87.6F

5 feet 88.2F

10 feet 88.5F

15 feet 87.2F

20 feet 86.2F

25 feet 85.6F

30 feet 85.3F

35 feet 85.0F

40 feet 84.5F

45 feet 83.7F

50 feet 81.9F

55 feet 80.7F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:15A

End Time: 10A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 79F

Elevation: 0.01′ high and falling slowly with a 33 cfs flow

Water Surface Temp: 87.6F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: Light and variable thru 9:15A, then ESE6

Sky Condition: Cloudless blue sky thru 9:15, then steadily increasing light grey cloud cover

Moon Phase: Waxing crescent moon at 22% illumination.

GT = 50

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Area B0113G – downrigging for white bass w/ #12 & #13 Pet Spoons under low-light conditions – 15 white bass

Area 014 – panfishing with bait and floats in shallow cover — 13 fish

Area B0021G thru B0194C – downrigging open water in bright conditions – 42 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)

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

6 Kings, and All Aces for 2 Hours — 57 Fish

August 10th, 2024August 10th, 2024 by Bob Maindelle

CLIENTS: On Thursday evening I welcomed aboard three generations of the King family. This was a “last chance to do something as a family before school starts” kind of trip. Aboard were grandparents David and Michelle King, parents Dustin and Cristina King, and kids Jackson (11) and Catherine (8) King. Everyone had prior fishing experience, and that helped plenty. We only fished the last two hours before dark, from 6:45 to 8:45PM, at my suggestion, as the oppressive heat has limited the evening bite to that time of low-light conditions, and, I was concerned about having kids out in the direct sun in 100+ degree weather.

DATE: Thursday, 08 August 2024 (PM)

NEXT OPEN DATES: 14 & 15 Aug. (AM & PM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left in the back row: Cristina, Dustin, Michelle, and David King. Front row: Jackson and Catherine King, each with white bass taken from the hot waters of Lake Belton on this 101F afternoon in August.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

SUMMARY OF HOW WE FISHED: It was pretty straightforward tonight: find fish, downrig for them with the balls set at or as much as 2′ above the tops of the schools of fish we encountered, and catch them. David and Dustin manned the ‘riggers doing the setting and adjusting, while allowing the kids and the ladies to do the catching. It worked great having these men right on the downriggers so we could do a lot of instant “micro-adjustments” to our trolling depth as sonar dictated. This crew landed singles, doubles and triples for a total catch of 57 fish in just 2 hours. These Kings were real aces!!

LURES USED SUCCESSFULLY ON THIS TRIP: We downrigged with 3-armed umbrella rigs equipped with #12 & 13 Pet Spoons for white bass the entire trip. Find three-armed umbrella rigs here: https://whitebasstools.com/

TALLY: 57 white bass caught and released

OBSERVATIONS:

1) A short peak or burst of activity came about 10 minutes either side of sunset when fish just seemingly materialized, coming shallow in large numbers, and occupying the entire lower half of the water column.

LATEST WATER TEMPERATURE PROFILE:

Here was the water temperature profile for Lake Belton, measured with a FishHawk TD device around 5:50 AM on August 5 …

0 feet 87.2F

5 feet 88.1F

10 feet 88.1F

15 feet 86.5F

20 feet 86.1F

25 feet 86.1F

30 feet 85.6F

35 feet 85.1F

40 feet 84.5F

45 feet 83.1F

50 feet 81.9F

55 feet 81.2F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:45P

End Time: 8:50P

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 101F

Elevation: 0.04′ low falling slowly with a 33 cfs flow, resulting in a 0.03′ fall over the last 24 hours

Water Surface Temp: 88.7F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: SE7-8

Sky Condition: Cloudless blue sky

Moon Phase: Waxing crescent moon at 15% illumination.

GT = 75

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Area B0186C to B0113G – downrigging for white bass w/ #12 & #13 Pet Spoons

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)

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com