CLIENTS: This morning, Monday, October 13, I fished a “Kids Fish, Too!“ birthday trip for Kinsley Bailey, accompanied by her mom and dad, Krista and Dustin Bailey.

The fact that this young lady had prior fishing experience really shown through today and helped her do far better than average.

 

ABOUT “KIDS FISH, TOO!” TRIPS:  Kids Fish, Too! trips are intended just for the kids. They are considerably less expensive than standard trips ($195 for up to 2 kids vs. $295 for up to 2 adults; and more can be added), and typically go a maximum of 3.5 hours versus 4-plus hours for standard trips.  On these trips, licensed adults who desire to do so often help me help the kids be successful by baiting hooks, untangling lines, resetting our downrigger spreads, etc. so the kids’ efforts are maximized, but, the adults do not fish.

 

TODAY’S DATE: Monday, 13 October 2025 (AM)

NEXT OPEN DATE FOR FISHING: Tuesday, 28 October 2025 (AM or PM)

 

 

PHOTO CAPTION:  Kinsley Bailey celebrated her 12th birthday on the water with her mom and dad thanks to a day off from school for Columbus Day.  She singlehandedly put 36 fish in the boat, including white bass, catfish, and panfish, using four very different tactics.

FIND THE LURES WE USED HERE: https://whitebasstools.com/

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

SUMMARY OF HOW WE FISHED:

I planned to break the morning down into several distinct parts, as I normally do for trips involving kids.

First, we downrigged for white bass, which were in the 30 foot range and both scattered and moving. We approached these fish with downriggers equipped with three-armed umbrella rigs terminated with #12 Pet Spoons. This accounted for our first seven fish of the morning.

Once the sun rose and killed that low-light bite, we continued looking in even deeper water, from 32 to 42 foot, for tightly schooled, bottom-hugging, white bass. I was fortunate to find what I was looking for fairly quickly. With two stops made in the same general vicinity, we picked up another 13 white bass, all on MAL Heavy lures with chartreuse tail, and all using the vertical smoking tactic.

When this area played out, I moved to a nearly identical area and we put another 10 white bass in the boat quite quickly. Kinsley had now been using the same tactic for about 90 minutes and, although we were still catching fish, I opted to change up our approach to help keep her engaged. At this point, we moved to an area I had freshened up with grain before the trip started this morning. In about 30 minutes’ time that area produced two channel catfish and several additional missed strikes.

As I coached Kinsley on what to expect from the catfish, I had her watch the rod tip as I tweaked the line with my finger to imitate the movement of the tip which the catfish would cause when they bit.  I then had her hold the rod and practice a swift, hard hookset whenever I said the word, “Boop!”.   Once we began to put these thing into practice, we kidded Kinsley as her lazer-focus on seeing and feeling the very light catfish bites led us to believe she was not even breathing for fear of adding unwanted motion to her rod tip while “waiting for the boop”!!

With about 30 minutes remaining the trip and the catfish not really putting on a great show, I decided to head up shallow and finish out the trip targeting sunfish.

With a piece of live bait under a slip float, Kinsley managed to pick up four panfish before we called it a good morning right at the 3 1/2 hour mark.

This morning‘s grand total was 36 fish. I am encouraged because the white bass response I saw today was by far the best I’ve seen thus far with this painfully slow autumn cool down.

RESULTS: 36 fish, all caught and released

 

OBSERVATIONS: Belton is 0.44′ low with a 0.02 fall in the last 24 hours with USACE releasing 43 CFS.  The white bass use of bottom seems to be increasing with each passing day as the water temperature continues to decrease, albeit very slowly.

 

LATEST WATER TEMPERATURE PROFILE: Taken on Lake Belton around 2 PM, Sunday, 12 October …

 

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 7:10A

End Time: 10:50A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 63F

Elevation: Belton is 0.44′ low with a 0.02 fall in the last 24 hours with USACE releasing 43 CFS.

Water Surface Temp: 80.9F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction:  S7-11 all morning

Sky Condition: 0% cloud cover on a blue sky

Moon Phase: Last quarter moon at 51% illumination.

GT = 5

 

Wx SNAPSHOT:  

 

 

AREAS FISHED WITH MOST SUCCESS:

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