Bob Maindelle | Fishing Report

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

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MILITARY KIDS FISH FOR FREE — 74 FISH w/ THE SMITH KIDS

July 6th, 2023July 6th, 2023 by Bob Maindelle

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Thursday, July 6th, I conducted the third Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun (SKIFF) trip of the 2023 season.

Joining me today were Mrs. Janea Smith and her two boys, Alex (age 14) and Corbin (age 7).

The boys’ father, a U.S. Army veteran who served in the military intelligence branch, passed away unexpectedly in January of this year at the age of 47.

ABOUT SKIFF: This fishing trip, like all SKIFF trips, was provided to this military family at no charge. 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.

Here’s how the fishing went…

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Here’s an up-to-date calendar so you can check availability: https://holdingthelineguideservice.com/available-dates.php

Next available dates are July 24 & 31 (AM)

PHOTO CAPTION: Alex Smith holds the third Stillhouse Hollow white bass exceeding 15″ to come aboard this week alone. Alex caught the fish using an MAL Heavy with white tail fished with a sawtooth method in around 34 feet of water.

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Corbin, Janea, and Alex Smith with a pair of fish we took early on in the trip. In the summer months, I don’t place fish taken from deep, cool water in the warm water of the livewell for photos later on as they tend not to do well.

WHERE WE FISHED: Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir

WHEN WE FISHED: Thursday, 06 July 2023 (AM)

HOW WE FISHED:

First, I’ve got to hand it to the boys’ mom, Janea. Not only is she raising two boys on her own with all the every-single-day demands that come with that, but, she had the boys up and arrived early despite their 5AM wakeup in the midst of a lazy summer-break non-routine!

Alex was already familiar enough with both casting and spinning gear to “validate” my normal introduction, but Corbin definitely benefitted from it.

Once the mini-lesson on how to retrieve their baits was complete, we set out to hunt fish. We started off with downriggers down to help search out active fish. Before we could get the second downrigger set out for Alex, Corbin’s ‘rigger went off with a double. We routinely took singles and doubles over the next 75 minutes or so until we’d tallied 18 fish and found our first large, somewhat stationary group of fish on sonar.

We quickly transitioned the boat from downrigger fishing to presenting MAL Lures by bringing the downriggers in and swinging the boom-arms out of the way, Spot-Locking atop the fish, putting the Garmin LiveScope tranducer pole in the water and firing up the Garmin monitor, putting MAL Heavy-equipped rods in the kids’ hands, and then letting these baits down to bottom to effect a “smoking” retrieve in an attempt to get these fish to chase, overtake, and strike these baits. Then, when the LiveScope revealed that the fish beneath the boat were waning, I checked H’bird side-imaging to see which side of the boat (if any) held additional fish. If we saw fish, we worked our baits on that side of the boat horizontally with a sawtooth method.

So it went — we downrigged to find fish and then used MAL Heavies vertically & horizontally to take advantage of what we’d found until the fish finally gave up around 10:25. During this time, we found a total of three large, fishable schools of fish to park over and present to.

By the time four hours had come and gone, my crew landed 74 fish including 72 white bass and 2 largemouth bass. Of this catch, only 1 white bass was “short” with yet another TPWD “Big Fish” — a white bass over 15″ — landed by Alex.

TALLY: 74 fish caught and released.

See a tutorial on the smoking tactic here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDSvfXgrAUE

Here is a tutorial on the Sawtooth Method: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IC3FMEQHOMQ

Find the entire family of MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

OBSERVATIONS: Minor largemouth bass schooling activity observed. Here is the temperature profile measured on Stillhouse on 03 July:

0 feet, 85.9F
5 feet, 86.2F
10 feet, 86.4F
15 feet, 86.4F
20 feet, 86.4F
25 feet, 85.9F
30 feet, 79.4F
35 feet, 72.7F
40 feet, 69.0F
45 feet, 66.3F
50 feet, 64.7F
55 feet, 62.9F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:25A

End Time: 10:25A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 77F

Elevation: 14.37 feet low, 1 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp: 85.9F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: S8-11 all morning

Sky Condition: Light blue skies with 50-60% white cloud cover

Moon Phase: Waning gibbous moon at 87% illumination.

GT = N/A

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Stopped to “smoke” white bass at Areas: vic SH0059G, vic SH0041C, and vic SH0222G – used MAL Heavy w/ white tails after finding fish in these areas with sonar and 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)

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Fishin’, Floatin’, & Fireworks — 70 Fish with Pops & Mimzy

July 5th, 2023 by Bob Maindelle

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Wednesday, July 5th, I fished with three (of the four) granddaughters of John and Ellen Agan (Pops & Mimzy) — twins Zoe and Nora, age 10, and their 8-year-old sister, Sena. The girls had come in for a week from their home in Sugarland, Texas, to visit with their grandparents, and that visit included this morning‘s fishing trip, as well as fireworks, some floating around in the pool, playing with cousins, and more.

John and Ellen were super folks; John has been in the banking business in Temple for many years, and Ellen is a retired physical therapist — the two of them were there to help me help the girls be successful and did a great job at that.

After taking the day off from fishing and conducting only a morning sonar training yesterday to avoid crowded holiday fishing conditions, we returned to a nearly empty lake and plenty of peace and quiet this morning to conduct this “Kids Fish, Too!” trip, just for the girls.

Here’s how the fishing went…

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Here’s an up-to-date calendar so you can check availability: https://holdingthelineguideservice.com/available-dates.php

Next available dates are July 24 & 31 (AM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Sena, John, Zoe, Ellen, and Nora Agan with a trio of quality Stillhouse white bass. The girls caught & released a total of 70 fish during their 3.5-hour “Kids Fish, Too!” trip.

WHERE WE FISHED: Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir

WHEN WE FISHED: Wednesday, 05 July 2023 (AM)

HOW WE FISHED:

Before we put lines in the water to catch fish, I did a dry run with each of the girls on how to use spinning rods and reels to fish the MAL Heavy Lure using a “smoking“ tactic. After very little practice, all three got the hang of smoothly reeling their bait up off the bottom while getting the spinner’s blade spinning early in the process. Once that was accomplished, I showed them how to hold and handle the casting rods we would be using for downrigging, and then we were off in pursuit of fish.

We employed what I have found is a tried, true, and consistent summertime producer for white bass, which is to use downriggers to both find fish and catch a few, then, use the information gathered while downrigging to fish vertically using MAL Lures for heavily concentrated fish first encountered while downrigging.

Over the course of the morning, we encountered three solid groups of fish, which, based on their appearance on sonar, and the fact that they aggressively chased and bit our downrigging set, led me to believe we could stop atop them using Spot-Lock and catch them vertically. All three of these attempts panned out and, when everything was said and done, the girls wound up catching exactly 70 fish, including 68 white bass and two largemouth bass. Both largemouth were legal, and only one of the 68 white bass was short.

For our downrigging, we used three-armed umbrella rigs with each of the leaders terminated with a #12 Pet Spoon, and as we smoked from a hovering position while using Garmin LiveScope, I had MAL Heavies with white tails tied on all of the girls’ spinning outfits.

As is typical for summertime on Stillhouse, the quality of the white bass far exceeded the quality of white bass at Lake Belton, however, there was next to no topwater action, thus, all fish had to be ferreted out using sonar, especially dialed-in side-imaging.

TALLY: 70 fish caught and released.

See a tutorial on the smoking tactic here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDSvfXgrAUE

Find the entire family of MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

OBSERVATIONS: No schooling largemouth bass or white bass activity observed. Here is the temperature profile measured on Stillhouse on 03 July:

0 feet, 85.9F
5 feet, 86.2F
10 feet, 86.4F
15 feet, 86.4F
20 feet, 86.4F
25 feet, 85.9F
30 feet, 79.4F
35 feet, 72.7F
40 feet, 69.0F
45 feet, 66.3F
50 feet, 64.7F
55 feet, 62.9F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:25A

End Time: 10:00A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 76F

Elevation: 14.30 feet low, 1 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp: 85.9F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: S8-11 all morning

Sky Condition: Light blue skies with 60-70% white cloud cover

Moon Phase: Waning gibbous moon at 94% illumination.

GT = 25

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Downrigging from vic S0120C thru SH0223G with stops atop concentrations of fish mixed in

Stopped to “smoke” white bass at Areas: vic SH0223G, vic SH0120C, and vic SH0228G – used MAL Heavy w/ white tails

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

PLEASE BRING THE LIMO AROUND — 100 FISH

July 3rd, 2023July 3rd, 2023 by Bob Maindelle

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Monday, July 3, I fished with returning guests Larry Miller, his grandson, Cameron (Cam) Miller, and two grandsons of Larry’s brother-in-law, Don Bousquet — Hudson and Townes Slimp. Cam and his grandfather traveled in from Louisiana, and the Slimp boys reside in Salado.

This entire crew has fished with me previously, but this was the first hot weather trip we’ve done together.

I tried to keep this crew posted on our progress by announcing every tenth fish we landed. As an incentive, Larry told the boys that if they hit a certain number, and if he hit the lottery, he’d get them whatever car they wanted. Well, Hudson wanted a Corvette, and then a Lamborghini was mentioned, but, when it came to little Townes, he said he wanted a limo. I told him that was very good “out of the box” thinking — whereas the older boys wanted fancy cars they’d have to drive and fuel up themselves, he requested a car which would come with a driver to do all the work for him!!!

Here is how the fishing went…

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Here’s an up-to-date calendar so you can check availability: https://holdingthelineguideservice.com/available-dates.php

Next available dates are July 24 & 31 (AM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Hudson Slimp, Cam Miller, Townes Slimp, and Larry Miller. This crew landed exactly 100 fish during their 4-hour morning trip on Stillhouse Hollow.

PHOTO CAPTION: Cam Miller qualified for a TPWD “Big Fish” Award by landing this white bass which exceeded 15″ in length. The actual measurement on this fish was 16.75″ and it was in great shape with a very girthy body.

WHERE WE FISHED: Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir

WHEN WE FISHED: Monday, 03 July 2023 (AM)

HOW WE FISHED:

This morning, I chose to move things over to Stillhouse, anticipating a real holiday zoo over on Lake Belton. Although there were plenty of anglers out on the water, the vast majority were after largemouth bass up shallow, so, I was still able to get to the areas I wanted to get to with my clients.

We used downrigging as a tool to find fish, catch them, and gauge their activity level, then when we found abundant, aggressive fish, we switched over and used vertical (“smoking”) tactics and horizontal (“sawtooth”) MAL Lure tactics to take advantage of what we’d found.

As the morning moved on, everyone got better at transitioning from one tactic to the other and back again so we had very little downtime between discovering active fish with a downriggers and presenting to them with a MAL Lures.

On the downriggers, I was running three-armed umbrella rigs equipped with #12 Pet Spoons. The MAL Lures I chose today were MAL Heavies with white tails now that the spawn is over and threadfin shad coloration is beginning to fade.

I had told the Slimp’s dad, Guy, that we would be back between 10:30 and 10:45. At exactly 10:20 AM, we had 90 fish landed. I told everyone we would give it until 10:30 or 100 fish which ever came first.

With a little time pressure now on them, the boys buckled down and really paid attention to their technique and to the sonar screens. At exactly 10:30 AM, our 100th fish came over the gunwale. Of those 100 fish landed, 99 were white bass, all of which were legal, in addition to one largemouth bass.

Two of the fish landed today earned the boys TPWD Big Fish certificates which will count toward Elite Angler status in the future. Cam took a 16.75 inch white bass, and Townes caught a 16.125 inch white bass. These were very impressive and healthy looking magnum whites.

TALLY: 100 fish caught and released.

Find the entire family of MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

OBSERVATIONS: Next to no schooling largemouth bass activity observed. Here is the temperature profile measured on Stillhouse on 03 July:

0 feet, 85.9F
5 feet, 86.2F
10 feet, 86.4F
15 feet, 86.4F
20 feet, 86.4F
25 feet, 85.9F
30 feet, 79.4F
35 feet, 72.7F
40 feet, 69.0F
45 feet, 66.3F
50 feet, 64.7F
55 feet, 62.9F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:25A

End Time: 10:30A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 78F

Elevation: 14.19 feet low, 1 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp: 85.9F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: S6-8 all morning

Sky Condition: Light blue skies with 30% white cloud cover

Moon Phase: Full moon at 100% illumination.

GT = 105

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Downrigging from vic 1423 thru SH0033G with stops atop concentrations of fish mixed in

Areas vic 1423, SH0031G, 889, vic 867, & vic SH0033G – Smoked for whites w/ MAL Heavy w/ white tails

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

JUST FOR WATSON — 50 FISH @ STILLHOUSE

June 29th, 2023 by Bob Maindelle

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Thursday, June 29, I fished with first time guests Mr. Victor Poole and his 10-year-old grandson, Watson Milam, both from the Waco area.

This was a “Kids Fish, Too!” trip, and was therefore a maximum of 3.5 hours in length, and a good bit less expensive than a 4-plus hour adult trip. On these kids trips, only the kids fish, and any adults attending simply help me help the kids be successful.

Here is how the fishing went…

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Here’s an up-to-date calendar so you can check availability: https://holdingthelineguideservice.com/available-dates.php

Next available dates are July 24 & 31 (AM)

PHOTO CAPTION: This 14.75″ white bass was taken by 10-year-old Watson Milam; it was one of 40 he landed “all by himself”.

PHOTO CAPTION: That’s Watson Milam and his grandfather, Victor Poole, who served as a very capable first mate today, helping me help Watson be successful.

WHERE WE FISHED: Stillhouse Hollow Reservoir

WHEN WE FISHED: Wednesday, 28 June 2023 (AM)

HOW WE FISHED:

We met up at 6:35 AM and I explained to Watson how to hold and use both a spinning outfit and a casting outfit, as I planned to use both in pursuit of white bass this morning.

We began downrigging with a single downrigger equipped with a 3-armed umbrella rig trailing three #12 Pet Spoons. We immediately got into fish just as the sun was clearing the horizon, and stayed in fish right through 9:15 AM when Watson’s interest began to wane.

On three occasions the concentration of fish we passed over while downrigging was sufficiently great that it led me to believe we could Spot-Lock on those fish and work MAL Heavy lures vertically through them.

This worked out well, as did the fact that the Garmin LiveScope really appealed to Watson, who expressed an interest in video games. Using a “smoking” retrieve through these fish which were in the lower fourth of the water column, we got them to concentrate beneath the boat using a splasher, and to chase Watson’s bait as he reeled quickly and smoothly on a consistent basis.

Watson caught a one-man limit of 25 white bass exceeding 10 inches by 8:37 AM, and landed another 15 legal fish by the time we changed tactics at 9:15 AM.

From 9:15 until 10:00 AM we pursued panfish up in shallow hydrilla using a pole with a float and bait suspended beneath. Watson picked up another 10 fish during this time, including bluegill sunfish, longear sunfish, and a single blacktail shiner.

At the 3.5 hour mark the heat was beginning to come on strong and we concluded this very successful children’s fishing trip with exactly 50 fish boated.

TALLY: 50 fish caught and released.

Find the entire family of MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

OBSERVATIONS: Next to no schooling largemouth bass activity observed.

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:35A

End Time: 10:05A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 78F

Elevation: 13.96 feet low, 0 CFS flow (thus causing a slight 24 hour rise)

Water Surface Temp: 84.5F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: Gusty at SSE9-13 all morning

Sky Condition: Light blue, cloudless skies all morning

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous moon at 80% illumination.

GT = 45

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Downrigging from 1397 thru SH0120C with stops atop concentrations of fish mixed in

Area vic 1397/1423 – Smoked for whites

Area SH0140G – Smoked for whites

Area 1412 – Smoked for whites

Areas 231 & 239 – 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)

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

COOKIE-CUTTER!! – 110 FISH @ LAKE BELTON

June 28th, 2023 by Bob Maindelle

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Wednesday, June 28, I fished with first time guests, Mr. Nathan Cain, accompanied by his 15-year-old daughter, Bailey, and 11-year-old son, Cole.

Nathan is a Belton native, who, after spending some time working abroad, has now returned to Belton where he works in support of Amazon facilities throughout the southeast and southwest.

As we fished, he shared memories of riding his bike to Arrowhead Point and Temple Lake Park to fish as a kid, and how his ancestors lived in the Tennessee Valley community, now inundated by Lake Belton.

Here is how the fishing went…

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Here’s an up-to-date calendar so you can check availability: https://holdingthelineguideservice.com/available-dates.php

Next available dates are July 24 & 31 (AM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Bailey, Cole, and Nathan Cain with a few of the 110 fish they caught by sight-casting and downrigging in the first 4 hours following sunrise.

PHOTO CAPTION: Cole Cain holds the only legal hybrid we landed today. This fish came out of ~18 feet of water and fell for a downrigged Pet Spoon worked behind a downrigger.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

WHEN WE FISHED: Wednesday, 28 June 2023 (AM)

HOW WE FISHED:

With this week’s weather solidly controlled by the dome of high pressure sitting right over Texas, this week’s fishing has been “cookie-cutter“ in regards to cloud cover (none), wind direction and velocity (SSE 11 to 13), temperature (78F at sunrise rising to 102 by mid-afternoon) and humidity (around 80% at sunrise, dropping into the 20s by sunset).

Likewise, the fishing has been very predictable, as well. Each day this week the low-light topwater action began within 5 or 10 minutes of the same time, and also ended within five or 10 minutes of the same time.

This morning, the topwater feeding spree began at 6:35 AM and lasted until 8:28 AM. During this time we began by throwing MAL Heavies with white tails to heavily congregated white bass churning the surface while feeding on shad of all sizes. As one school would stop feeding and submerge, a new school would start feeding a few yards away, and so on. Most of these schools were roughly 20 yards in diameter and included several hundred individuals.

After the fish had fed for a while, we noted that they began regurgitating freshly eaten shad. As I observed this, it was quite clear that, despite the presence of adult shad, the majority of the baitfish being consumed were young-of-the-year shad less than 2 inches in length. Seeing this, I immediately switched everyone over to MAL Minis, and our already solid catch rate increased substantially. Everyone went from catching one fish every three to four casts to catching fish on just about every other cast.

To make a good thing even better, I coached everyone to retrieve immediately after their lure hit the water when the fish were churning on the surface, and to do a six-count, allowing the lure to sink before retrieving, whenever the fish were present, but not on the surface. By the time 8:28 rolled around and the last of the surface activity disappeared, my crew of three had landed 77 fish.

We left the area we’d been fishing and cruised around looking for evidence of the presence of fish (birds diving, bait jumping, fish churning on the surface). Seeing none, I moved us once again, and found an area loaded down with bait. We no sooner prepared for downrigging than we witnessed a brief additional topwater episode. We took 11 fish rather quickly, but that action dissipated within minutes. From that point on, we ran a single downrigger at first, and then branched out into twin downriggers, each equipped with three-armed umbrella rigs with #12 Pet Spoons on the business end. We took an additional 22 fish on the downriggers coming as singles, doubles, and one triple.

By the time the four hour mark approached, we had landed 110 fish, which included 3 hybrid stripers (of which one was legal), 2 freshwater drum, and 105 white bass.

TALLY: 110 fish caught and released.

Find the entire family of MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

OBSERVATIONS: 1) USACE has stopped releasing water from the dam. 2) Temperature profile taken morning of 26 June:

0 feet, 84.2F
5 feet, 84.0F
10 feet, 85.1F
15 feet, 84.8F
20 feet, 84.5F
25 feet, 81.5F
30 feet, 75.6F
35 feet, 71.3F
40 feet, 68.1F
45 feet, 66.1F
50 feet, 64.9F
55 feet, 63.3F
60 feet, 62.2F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:10A

End Time: 10:15A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 77F

Elevation: 13.39 feet low, 0 CFS flow (thus causing a slight 24 hour rise)

Water Surface Temp: 84.3F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: SSE11 all morning

Sky Condition: Light blue, cloudless skies all morning

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous moon at 71% illumination.

GT = 40

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Areas 1376, 848, and B0201G — sight casting to topwater feeders; 77 fish

Area vic 1974 – 33 fish by 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)

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

YOUTHFUL ENTHUSIASM!! – 78 FISH @ LAKE BELTON

June 27th, 2023June 27th, 2023 by Bob Maindelle

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Tuesday, June 27, I fished a “Kids Fish, Too!“ trip for Kara Hubbert’s four kiddos – Emily Hubbert (age 14), Keely Riley (age 11), Bailey Hubbert (age 10), and Jason Hubbert (age 8).

Of the four kids, only Jason had been out with me previously. None of the kids had much prior experience casting spinning gear, so, our first order of business was to do a quick train-up in the very likely case that white bass made themselves visible on the surface as they trapped shad there to feed upon them.

Here is how the fishing went…
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Here’s an up-to-date calendar so you can check availability: https://holdingthelineguideservice.com/available-dates.php

Next available dates are July 24 & 31 (AM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Jason Hubbert, Keely Riley, Bailey Hubbert, Kara Hubbert, and Emily Hubbert, each with one of the 78 fish the kids landed by sightcasting and downrigging this morning on Lake Belton.

PHOTO CAPTION: Keely Riley, age 11, with one of two legal hybrid stripers she fought on a hot, clear, breezy late June morning on Lake Belton. Of all the kids, she was definitely the most enthusiastic about the fishing. I think she’d have stayed ’til dark if the fish cooperated!

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

WHEN WE FISHED: Tuesday, 27 June 2023 (AM)

HOW WE FISHED:

As we got going, we started off the morning with twin downriggers in the water working three-armed umbrella rigs equipped with #12 Pet Spoons along wind-blown underwater terrain after finding ample bait present in the area. As happened yesterday, after taking a few rounds of fish on the downriggers, the white bass began to feed on the surface under low light conditions, albeit without any cloud cover.

I waited until the topwater got absolutely intense before changing over from downrigging to casting, knowing that the kids’ distance and accuracy would be somewhat lacking. Whenever the intense surface action died down, we would go back to downrigging until another instance of intense surface action materialized when we would go back to casting, and so on.

This lasted through about 8:20 when the surface activity ended for good just as the 13-14mph SSE winds began to relent. From that point on, we downrigged exclusively as the kids all mentioned their wrists were hurting from casting, retrieving, and reeling in fish while using spinning gear.

From 8:20A, the fishing got progressively slower through the time we wrapped up right around 10 AM.

When all was said and done, the kids landed 78 fish including four hybrid stripers, of which two were legal, and 74 white bass, of which only four were short.

TALLY: 78 fish caught and released.

Find the entire family of MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

OBSERVATIONS: 1) USACE has stopped releasing water from the dam. 2) Temperature profile taken morning of 26 June:

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:25A

End Time: 10:10A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 77F

Elevation: 13.23 feet low, 0 CFS flow (thus causing a slight 24 hour rise)

Water Surface Temp: 84.2F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: SSE13-14 through 8:20A, then tapering down to SSE7 by trip’s end

Sky Condition: Light blue, cloudless skies all morning

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous moon at 62% illumination.

GT = 0

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Areas B0030G/B0102C – alternating between downrigging Pets and sight casting MAL Heavies through 8:20A

Area 815/B0031G – downrigging exclusively thru 10AM

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

HIGH PRESSURE FISHING – 101 FISH @ LAKE BELTON

June 26th, 2023June 26th, 2023 by Bob Maindelle

WHO I FISHED WITH:

This morning, Monday, June 26, I fished with returning guest, Mr. Freddy Mize from Montgomery, Texas, accompanied by first time guests David Mize (Freddy‘s son), and David’s two adult sons, Kolby and Clayton.

Freddy and his wife came out with me a few years back and had a good time, and so his daughter-in-law, Tabatha (David’s wife) coordinated this trip way back in late April to send all four of the fellows out once again.

Here is how the fishing went…

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Here’s an up-to-date calendar so you can check availability: https://holdingthelineguideservice.com/available-dates.php

Next available dates are July 24 & 31 (AM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: David, Freddy, Clayton, and Kolby Mize with a portion of their 101-fish catch under hot, dry, high pressure weather conditions.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

WHEN WE FISHED: Monday, 26 June 2023 (AM)

HOW WE FISHED:

We got going at 6:15 AM and a pretty stiff 12 to 14 mph breeze made spotting top water action pretty tough. I quickly surveyed a number of areas and did not see anything to really get excited about, so, we hunkered down over an area where an abundance of bait was showing on sonar and began downrigging.

We pulled a few fish on the downriggers, and as we were getting set to put them back out again, the surface erupted with what would turn into about 80 minutes’ worth of solid action. Multiple large schools of white bass were herding bait to the surface. This bait included everything from the youngest of the young-of-the-year shad to adult shad.

Since all four of my clients were able to cast spinning gear, I put some 8′ long, light action, St. Croix Panfish Series spinning rods in their hands mated to Pflueger Large Arbor reels and light braid so they could throw the MAL Mini quite some distance. This accounted for our first 45 fish before the topwater action got more spotty.

Sonar clearly revealed that the fish were still in the area, but they just moved further down in the water column as the cloudless sky got brighter and brighter. Seeing this, and having witnessed adult shad in the area, I was not hesitant to swap out the rods, reels and lures everyone was using and replace them with spinning outfits pre-rigged with MAL Heavies. Once everyone was re-rigged, I coached everyone to let their casts sink to bottom and then do a plain-Jane retrieve at a moderately fast cadence in order to cover the entire water column.

We picked up another 30 fish in this manner before this action died.

I headed out looking for fish, bait, and bird action. At this point, I looked in the same areas where last week’s late morning bites tended to take place.

There was really not much going on here, so, I went looking for more concentrated bait in an attempt to wrap up the trip by downrigging and put a few final fish in the boat. We found a fairly straight stretch of bank being directly impacted by the wind with a lot of small shad in the lower half of the water column. We got downriggers going, each equipped with a three-armed umbrella rig, and had steady action right until around 10:15. We landed another 26 fish downrigging, including 24 white bass coming in singles and doubles, as well as one largemouth bass, and one freshwater drum.

With the downrigging getting tougher with each pass we made, we decided to call it a good morning at 10:15 with 101 fish landed, including three hybrid striped bass (all short), one largemouth, one freshwater drum, and the balance white bass, only two of which were under sized.

TALLY: 101 fish caught and released.

Find the entire family of MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

OBSERVATIONS: 1) USACE has stopped releasing water from the dam. 2) Temperature profile taken morning of 26 June:

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:15A

End Time: 10:20A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 78F

Elevation: 13.30 feet low, 0 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp: 84.2F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: SSE11-13 all morning

Sky Condition: Light blue, cloudless skies all morning

Moon Phase: First quarter moon at 52% illumination.

GT = 50

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Areas 473/472 – downrigging under sunrise low-light conditions leading to sight-casting with MAL Minis and Heavies for 75 fish from 7:05 to 8:25

Area vic 1974 – downrigging for fish getting increasing disinterested from 9:25 to 10:15

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

TWO IS COMPANY; THREE’S … MORE COMPANY!! — 76 FISH @ BELTON

June 22nd, 2023 by Bob Maindelle

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Thursday, June 23, I fished with three teens – – Ricky and Bronson Brown, and Tyler Hickman. This trip was arranged in celebration of Ricky’s birthday by his mom, Lori Brown.

This was a “Kids Fish, Too!“ fishing trip specifically for young people. These trips go a maximum of 3.5 hours versus 4+ hours for adults, and they also are more economically priced.

Here is how the fishing went…
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Here’s an up-to-date calendar so you can check availability: https://holdingthelineguideservice.com/available-dates.php

Next available dates are July 10 & 24 (AM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Ricky and Bronson Brown, and Tyler Hickman took 75 legal white bass in their 76-fish catch this morning on Lake Belton. This was in celebration of Ricky’s recent birthday.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

WHEN WE FISHED: Thursday, 22 June 2023 (AM)

HOW WE FISHED:

A wrinkle in the weather overnight saw a line of thunderstorms sweep over Central Texas during the early morning hours. In that front’s wake, we were left with cloudy skies and winds from a variety of directions.

At sunrise, the winds were southeasterly. Then, within the hour, they switched to easterly, then northeasterly, and, by around 8:15 the winds were out of the northwest. During all of these wind shifts, the velocity stayed under 9 mph.

Since I did not see much low light surface action this morning, we started off by downrigging a pair of three-armed umbrella rigs with #12 Pet Spoons trailing behind. I saw both bait and gamefish suspended at around 16 feet over a deeper bottom and so we pegged the downrigger weights at 14 feet to keep the baits near and above the gamefish.

Ricky kicked us off with a triple, followed by a double boated by Tyler, then Bronson chipped in with a single. We continued catching doubles and singles until our tally had climbed to 18 fish, and the bite began to slacken as the winds shifted more easterly.

With that easterly wind shift, we went nearly a full fishless hour from about 7:10 to 8:00 before spotting some “popcorn“ white bass schooling activity. As I looked things over with sonar, I really did not see any consistency on depth nor location for these nomadic schools of fish, so we returned to downrigging in order to cover ground while studying sonar, yet still have baits in the water. Around 8 AM, I got a call from a buddy who was in the same location where I seen those “popcorn” schools earlier. He let me know that he was witnessing some more consistent surface activity.

We returned to the area, and continued to witness this same popcorn activity, but it was definitely with increased frequency, so, I put the downriggers back down and we lingered in that area to see if something might develop further.

That turned out well, as the bite slowly strengthened until finally, between about 9 AM and 9:40 AM a sustained topwater bite broke out, thus making the catching much easier for my youthful crew. Before this action broke out we had taken our tally to 32 fish. By the time this feeding spree ended at around 9:50, we had taken our tally to a final count of 76 fish.

As these fish fed on the surface, I had all three boys throw MAL Heavy Lures with chartreuse tails toward the heaviest action they could spot and reach, let the lures fall to bottom in about 22 feet of water, and then bring them back using a plain-Jane retrieve with a moderately fast cadence. This ensured each cast covered the entire water column from bottom to top.

We chose the full-sized MAL Heavies because it was obvious by watching the fish feed on the surface that they were chasing adult shad (although smaller bait could certainly have been present, as well).

Of the 76 fish landed, 100% were white bass, and only one of these white bass was short.

TALLY: 76 fish caught and released.

Find the entire family of MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

OBSERVATIONS: Temperature profile taken morning of 21 June:

0 feet, 82.3F
5 feet, 82.6F
10 feet, 82.7F
15 feet, 82.1F
20 feet, 78.9F
25 feet, 74.7F
30 feet, 72.8F
35 feet, 70.5,F
40 feet, 68.2F
45 feet, 65.5F
50 feet, 63.9F
55 feet, 62.8F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:15A

End Time: 9:50A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 75F

Elevation: 13.06 feet low, 65 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp: 82.3F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: At sunrise, the winds were southeasterly 8-9. Then, within the hour, they switched to easterly 8, then northeasterly 8, and, by around 8:15 the winds were out of the north west @6-8.

Sky Condition: 100% light grey cloud cover until 8:15’s wind shift, then slowly clearing to 40% white cloud cover on a hazy blue sky.

Moon Phase: Waxing crescent moon at 17% illumination.

GT = P

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Area 667/B0030G – downrigging under sunrise low-light conditions

Area B0068G – downrigging until “popcorn” schooling got more intense and coalesced, then cast-and-crank with MAL Heavies

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

IT’S TOASTY OUT THERE! — 80 FISH @ LAKE BELTON

June 21st, 2023 by Bob Maindelle

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Wednesday, June 21, I fished with returning guests, Rudy Porter and his two sons, Max and Roman. Accompanying the Porters for the first time aboard my boat were brothers Rohan and Akhil Gudapati. The Gudapatis had gone fishing once before, but had never caught anything so, they were truly starting from scratch today.

The Porters are in visiting from New Mexico where they reside in a dry, high desert climate. Needless to say, the humidity was kicking their butts by mid-trip!!

Here’s how the fishing went…

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Here’s an up-to-date calendar so you can check availability: https://holdingthelineguideservice.com/available-dates.php

Next available dates are July 10 & 24 (AM)

PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Max Porter, Rohan and Akhil Gudapati, and Roman Porter with a portion of their white bass catch made by sight-casting, counting down, and “smoking” MAL Heavy Lures, as well as by downrigging.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

WHEN WE FISHED: Wednesday, 21 June 2023 (AM)

HOW WE FISHED:

Despite being under an ongoing, and already several days-long, excessive heat warning, our conditions this morning were tolerable, as there was both a breeze and cloud cover until about 9:50 AM. As we got going, I felt the simplest approach would be to downrig to find fish and then set up over top of them to work in MAL Lures vertically with the help of Garmin LiveScope after the fish had been found.

We began downrigging with both downriggers running three-armed umbrella rigs equipped with #12 Pet Spoons in silver with white tail. We steadily picked up singles and doubles as the light level remained dim and the skies fairly murky gray. Once the gray skies began to lighten up as the sun’s angle increased, some difficult-to-discern topwater action began to materialize, well-disguised by the chop of the 8 or 9 mph wind blowing.

Against my better judgment, I gave casting lessons to everyone quickly (as they did not have a chance to practice before the trip, as I had hoped) and, with the boat on Spot-Lock, had everybody cast off of the starboard side to fish feeding on and near the surface. For a number of reasons, this, after several attempts, just did not turn out to be as productive as the downrigging.

Whenever the fish disappeared from the surface, and the catching got tough, we reverted to downrigging until the fish quit in this area. The time was now 8:10 AM, and we had boated 34 fish.

Our next success came over open water. A buddy alerted me to the presence of fish in a general area. Upon arrival, we saw where a trio of blue herons were repeatedly diving down, trying to spear white bass as the white bass forced shad up against the surface in an attempt to trap and eat them there.

I once again positioned the boat so all five anglers could cast off the starboard side. When the fish were on the surface, I had them retrieve immediately. When the fish left the surface, I had them count their MAL Heavy Lures down to a six count, and do a straight, plain-Jane retrieve back to the boat. The entire time this horizontal casting was going on, I also ran the splasher, and got the LiveScope units fired up in hopes of consolidating fish under the boat.

This actually did pan out well. After the fish quit hitting on the surface, we were able to continue catching fish which were holding beneath us in a horizontal band about 20 feet beneath the surface in about 40 feet of water. We put another 40 fish in the boat by 9:40 AM.

By 9:40, the skies began to clear, and the wind began to slack off. As this happened, the fishing got instantly tougher. We stayed until 10:20 and managed to land another six fish, all by downrigging, before calling it a good morning as the heat began to pour on.

TALLY: 80 fish caught and released

Find the entire family of MAL Lures here: https://whitebasstools.com/

OBSERVATIONS: Temperature profile this morning:

0 feet, 82.3F
5 feet, 82.6F
10 feet, 82.7F
15 feet, 82.1F
20 feet, 78.9F
25 feet, 74.7F
30 feet, 72.8F
35 feet, 70.5,F
40 feet, 68.2F
45 feet, 65.5F
50 feet, 63.9F
55 feet, 62.8F

WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 6:15A

End Time: 10:20A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 77F

Elevation: 13.05 feet low, 24 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp: 82.3F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: S8-9 through 9:50, then easing up to S5-6

Sky Condition: 100% light grey cloud cover between 6 and 9:50 AM gave way to 20% white cloud cover on a hazy blue sky thereafter

Moon Phase: Waxing crescent moon at 10% illumination.

GT = 30

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Area 483/B0103C – 34 fish by sight-casting and downrigging

Area 1519/B0093G – 40 fish by sight-casting, counting down, and smoking MAL Heavies

Area 1402/B0022C – 6 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