Fished a half-day morning trip this morning with Doug and Sandy B. of Killeen. As we discussed this couple’s expectations for the trip, Doug let me know he’d rather pursue a few quality fish versus going for quantity. With this in mind we rigged up for live shad fishing targeting hybrid striper on Belton Lake.

DOUG AND SANDY WITH DOUG’S BIG BIRTHDAY SURPRISE, 37 INCHES

SANDY INSISTED ON USING MY LARGEST LIVE BAITS AND IT PAID OFF FOR HER

A POST-SUNSET BUFFALO TAKEN ON A 3/8 oz. BLADEBAIT

Start Time: 6:30a

End Time: 1:00a

Air Temp: 72F at trip’s start.

Water Surface Temp: ~75-76F

Wind: Winds were SE at 11 at (obscured) sunrise. Around 9:00a, winds shifted ENE and a light rain fell with darkening skies. Not long after, the skies, though still cloudy, brightened a bit and the winds lessened and went back ESE at around 9 for the remainder of the trip.

Skies: Heavy clouds until 2p, then clearing to fair for the remainder of the day.

We looked in a number of areas today for fish and found little on sonar at Areas 024, 308, 346, 365, and 415

We enjoyed success at the stretch between Areas 133 and 080 , however these fish were scattered and suspended, so I used the downriggers with one fixed and one as a fish chaser. After boating 8 fish, all were white bass and sonar was not revealing any compelling clues that the remainder of the fish we were seeing were hybrid so we left (small) fish to find (larger) fish.

We found fish an boated one hybrid and a 15″ blue cat at Area 155, then drifted from there to Area 154 and beyond it, heading W. on the E. wind without result.

We then moved to Area 168/169 and got into the most consistent action of the day. We baited with jumbo gizzard shad (up to 13″). We missed a number of fish here as Doug tried to find the sweet spot on his hooksets, but, in the end boated 3 fish, including the catch of the day — a nice, healthy, hard-pulling 37″ flathead catfish that took a 9 inch long gizzard shad.

We finished up with a drift over Area 098 which yielded a white bass and a second hybrid after which we called it a day.

After dropping my guests off, I headed back out to catch shad for an upcoming trip on Saturday.

Found abundant gizzard shad at Area 435, netting 64 gizzards in 7 throws.

I then sampled a few areas with fresh shad, still looking for a good population of hybrid, but found none. I did catch several nice largemouth and a blue cat at Area 442, a blue cat and a drum at Area 138, and a large smallmouth buffalo up shallow to the W. of Area 437.

TALLY = 22 FISH, all caught and released

Bob Maindelle, Owner, Holding The Line Guide Service and Kids Fish, Too! Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide, Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Lake Georgetown Fishing Guide, Walter E. Long (Decker) Lake Fishing Guide. Offering Salado Fishing, Killeen Fishing and Ft. Hood Fishing

Fished a half-day morning trip this morning with Rod T. of Copperas Cove. Rod and I are buddies from church. He’s winding up his tour here at Ft. Hood and shipping off to the D.C. area, so we took a farewell fishing trip before he pulls up stakes.

ROD T. WITH 1 OF 53 WE BOATED TODAY

Start Time: 6:30a

End Time: 11:30a

Air Temp: 74F at trip’s start.

Water Surface Temp: ~74-75F

Wind: Winds were SW at 2-6 at sunrise, staying light until around 9:30a, then picking up SE, then E, then NE by trip’s end.

Skies: Skies were mostly cloudy with high humidity causing haziness.

As we began our trip, we slowly motored over an expanse of open water known for topwater action this time of year wherein hungry white bass feeding up after the spawn pin shad fry against the surface early and late in the day. Today, the conditions were just right — a light wind, an overcast sky well into the morning, and no easterly component to the wind.

In a circular area bounded by Area 432 to the west and Area 337 to the east, we found ample topwater action for nearly 2 hours and during that time landed 44 fish, both white bass and small largemouth, all on the Cork Rig. Many boats passed right by this action due to the subtlety of the feeding — no splashes, no rings on the surface, just soft, near surface swipes leaving little visual evidence unless you were stopped and looking for it.

After this action waned, we headed down and looked between Areas 007 and 217. We saw 3 individual fish strike shad on the surface upon arrival, but little after that.

Headed to Area 433 and we both worked a jigworm for about 30 minutes for a single keeper largemouth.

Our next success came after a tip from the terns. They were circling over Area 434 on top of some schoolie largemouth popping shad on top. We stopped and added 3 bass to the count here, all just shy of legal.

Our final stop came at Area 145. Right in the middle of this complex we encountered both bottom hugging and suspended schooled whites. By now the wind had turned E and was on its way to NE, so I didn’t expect much of a bite. Despite seeing more fish, we landed only 5 here, all on the TNT180 in 3/8 oz. via jigging and smoking.

And so ended the farewell trip with Rod. God bless you, Paula, Amber, and Anndrea as you head north. Give me a ring when the stripers come up out of the ocean!!

TALLY = 53 FISH, all caught and released

Bob Maindelle, Owner, Holding The Line Guide Service and Kids Fish, Too! Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide, Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Lake Georgetown Fishing Guide, Walter E. Long (Decker) Lake Fishing Guide. Offering Salado Fishing, Killeen Fishing and Ft. Hood Fishing

Fished a half-day morning trip this morning with Danny and Kim M. of Georgetown, and Danny’s parents, Bonnie and Harold, visiting from New Mexico.

MRS. BONNIE WITH HER BIGGEST FISH OF THE DAY

MRS. KIM WITH HER 15″+ WHITE BASS TAKEN ON LIVE SHAD

HAROLD’S 11th HOUR BLACK BASS TAKEN ON A JUMBO GIZZARD SHAD

Start Time: 7:15a

End Time: 12:30p

Air Temp: 74F at trip’s start.

Water Surface Temp: ~73-74F

Wind: Winds were SE at 12+ at sunrise, increasing quickly to 22+.

Skies: Skies were mostly cloudy with high humidity causing haziness.

In advance of this trip Danny and I agreed that a more “laid back approach” than I typically take would be appropriate for his parents. We hoped to get on Belton to live shad fish for hybrid, but the wind forecast spelled trouble, so we stuck to Stillhouse and enjoyed the protection that the south shore affords.

We started the day looking shallow in 14-16 feet using slabs and watching sonar. Right off the bat we landed 2 whites as they passed suspended beneath us in a school. Harold had good reflexes and got his slab up through them in time to intercept, as did I. Mrs. Kim and Mrs. Bonnie were not quite as fortunate. Regardless, we established the presence of fish in the area, and although a few continued to show on sonar, none were on bottom. So, I rigged up one, then two, downriggers and we downrigged with White Willows (due to olive brown murk still remaining from the recent flood waters) landing 7 fish in this area before pulling out and searching elsewhere.

Our next stop came at Area 145. We made a short drift through here from SE to NW with a driftsock out. There wasn’t much in the way of fish or bait showing up, but Mrs. Kim did manage one nice 15+ inch white bass.

We moved again to Areas 429 and 430 and made 3-4 stops in an attempt to vertical jig a few additional fish, but got none. Again I deployed the downriggers, and we scraped up one keeper largemouth, this time for Mrs. Bonnie.

We left here and gave the channel break a try at between Areas 76 and 243. We added 7 more white bass to our count here using dual White Willows fished within 2′ of bottom and fished this action until it died.

Around 11:45 we set up on our last area of the day, Area 253 and about 180 yards to the NNW of it on a drift with large live gizzard shad. No sooner did we get our drift set up than all 3 rods went down. We only came up with one of the fish, but it was the largest of the trip caught by Harold — a 16 inch largemouth. We completed the drift with only 2 other “touches” and no hookups. A subsequent drift over this area yielded nil.

We called it a day at this point with the wind only continuing to increase and bellies starting to growl for some good ol’ Johnny’s Barbeque.

TALLY = 18 FISH, all caught and released

Bob Maindelle, Owner, Holding The Line Guide Service and Kids Fish, Too! Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide, Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Lake Georgetown Fishing Guide, Walter E. Long (Decker) Lake Fishing Guide. Offering Salado Fishing, Killeen Fishing and Ft. Hood Fishing Guide

Fished a “split trip” today with Matt. W. of the Austin area. Matt had an earnest desire to improve his consistency on his home waters of Georgetown Lake and Lake Austin and fished with me to learn my approach to ferreting out fish and to pick my brain on a number of topics. Matt came with an open mind and was ready to learn, not to demonstrate what he’d learned already, and that made a huge difference in what I could help him with.

MATT WITH A SHAD-CAUGHT BELTON HYBRID

Start/End Time: 6:30a-1:15p, and 6:00p – 8:15p

Air Temp: 74F at trip’s start climbing into the low 80’s

Water Surface Temp: ~73-74F

Wind: Winds were SE at ~7-9 until around 10:30a, then went SSW at 9-12 until around 1p, then stayed SE at 9-11 the remainder of the day.

Skies: Skies were mostly cloudy through mid afternoon, then went partly cloudy with some direct sun breaking through.



Our split trip took place in the morning on Stillhouse and in the evening on Belton.

On Stillhouse we encountered success at between Areas 007 and 217 finding light topwater feeding by whites and largemouth over open water. These fish were preying upon shad fry. Accurate, gently worked casts with the Cork Rig did the trick for 8 fish. This action was fairly short-lived.

We then found some rock-oriented largemouth at Area 433 and fished these with a jigworm. We boated 4 fish here, and had 2 more hooked and missed on the jump.

We then encountered a bit of a lull but the fish perked up as soon as the SE wind went SW. As this happened, I moved us to Area 429 / 430 and we immediately got into heavily schooled white bass congregated on bottom in 25-34′. Over the next 2 1/2 hours we stayed on these fish and, using the TNT 180 3/8 oz. slab, jigged up 115 fishing including mainly white bass with several largemouth thrown in, in addition to crappie and drum. By 1:15 the wind was swinging back out of the SE and the action diminished.

Before our evening trip I netted live shad. There were abundant, large gizzards found from Area 170 to Area 435. I typically got 2-5 shad per throw.

At 6p we met again at Belton Lake. I anticipated a weak bite tonight due to the late hour at with the morning feed ended and the fact that the SE wind hadn’t let up.

We headed to Area 163 and found semi-active fish on and just off bottom in ~24-26′ of water. I hooked the first fish — and then lost it at the boat — a hybrid of about 5-6 pounds.

We then managed 11 whites and 1 hybrid on the slab and 2 hybrids and 1 white on live gizzard shad. The largest fish of the night was a sweet 5.75 pound hybrid that Matt hit on the live shad.

As sunset came, we did not find any surface feeding fish as I hoped we might.

TALLY = 142 FISH

Bob Maindelle, Owner, Holding The Line Guide Service and Kids Fish, Too! Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide, Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Lake Georgetown Fishing Guide, Walter E. Long (Decker) Lake Fishing Guide. Offering Salado Fishing, Killeen Fishing and Ft. Hood Fishing

Fished a “Kids Fish, Too” trip this morning with a dad (Thom G.) and 3 boys, Carson age 3, Garrett age 5, and Kyle age 6, all from Georgetown. This trip was in celebration of Garrett’s fifth birthday.

THE BIRTHDAY BOY, GARRETT

LITTLE BROTHER, CARSON (a.k.a. Greg Louganis – just a little inside humor between dad and I)

BEST BUDDY, KYLE

Start Time: 7:25a

End Time: 11:00a

Air Temp: 56F at trip’s start

Water Surface Temp: ~69-70F

Wind: Winds were NNW at ~7-11

Skies: Skies were mostly clear

Lake Elevation: The lake has now leveled off at ~ 620.54 ft. ASL

We got on the water a little later than usual today and so forfeited the pre-dawn topwater bite, but did just fine, all things considered. The topwater I’ve found has required some pretty accurate casting, perhaps too accurate given the boys’ age on today’s breezy trip.

I checked out the Area 103 / 108 complex and saw nothing on sonar and left without wetting a line.

We began fishing in the vicinity of Area 429 / 430 by downrigging for white bass with Pet Spoons over 14-26 feet of water. On our very first pass we saw plenty of fish on sonar on and up off bottom and so my fears about the cold front that passed through yesterday having a negative impact on the fishing were relieved. The boys did well taking turns at catching the fish as the white bass cooperated for about 2 hours solid. During this time, we caught 10 white bass and 2 largemouth. The boys eventually expanded their horizons from just reeling in the fish to letting the line out to get the downrigger set, netting fish, retrieving the downrigger ball, and more. By around 10a, the white bass were playing out and the boys’ interest in this approach was waning, so we changed up a bit.

We headed to the south bank and did some flatline trolling. The Bombers came up with 3 largemouth, 2 caught and 1 escaping on the jump. Subsequent passes yielded little, so we changed up tactics once again.

We headed to Area 203 and baited up with poles and floats looking for the first sunfish of the year. As we got to this area and got our first line in the water, a large school of spottails showed themselves. After the two older boys learned to appreciate the importance of landing their presentation in the shade where the fish were hiding, they were able to catch these fish with little assistance from me. In all, we landed 9 spottails. By this time, we were about 4 hours into the trip and just about to the limit of the boys’ attention span.

Dad and I exchanged knowing glances and we headed back to the dock after an enjoyable, successful day on the water.

Now, at this point, the youngest, Carson, had 2 spottails in his fist and wasn’t planning on letting them go until he was back home in Georgetown! Well, the other boys then needed souvenir fish, too. Carson was willing to share one, so that left us one souvenir fish short. I quickly broke out the pole once again and quickly had a green sunfish in the boat so all 3 boys had something to take home to mom.

I just had to laugh at our birthday boy’s parting comment — his dad asked him “What do you think about doing a fishing trip for the rest of your birthday parties as you get older?” Garrett was very ready with a reply and, without batting an eye said, “Well, I’d like to do a fishing birthday party for every birthday up until I’m 19. Then when I’m 19 and about to turn 20, I want to go to Chuck E. Cheese instead.” And so ended Garrett’s big day on the water!!

TALLY = 23 FISH, all caught and released (save the two spottails and 1 perch the boys took home to mom as souvenirs!!)

Bob Maindelle, Owner, Holding The Line Guide Service and Kids Fish, Too! Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide, Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Lake Georgetown Fishing Guide, Walter E. Long (Decker) Lake Fishing Guide. Offering Salado Fishing, Killeen Fishing and Ft. Hood Fishing

Quick trip tonight to see if I could find any topwater action. As I looked over things earlier in the day, around sunrise, I noted abundant threadfin shad spawning in the newly flooded vegetation.

THE 2 AREAS OF “NERVOUS” WATER SHOW THE THREADFIN SHAD SPAWNING THIS MORNING

Start Time: 6:45p

End Time: 8:30p

Air Temp: 81F at trip’s start with occasional light drizzle.

Water Surface Temp: ~68-69F

Wind: Winds were SE at ~10-11.

Skies: Skies were entirely clouded grey the entire trip.

Lake Elevation: The lake rose has now leveled off at ~ 620.54 ft. ASL

The SE wind made good topwater conditions unlikely. I did get on Area 429 / 430 and found solid fishing from arrival at 7:00p until around 8:10p. During this time I caught 27 fish including 23 white bass of all sizes with none exceeding 13.5 inches, as well as 2 keeper largemouth, a crappie, and a drum.

At exactly 8:10, I heard topwater action and from that point focused only on surface/subsurface retrieves targeting these fish. When all was said and done, what little topwater cropped up only lasted about 5 minutes and was very weak and well-dispersed, from Area 429/430 to Area 159. I picked up 3 whites on top on the cork rig and called it quits at dark at 8:30 with exactly 30 fish boated.

TALLY = 30 FISH, all caught and released

Bob Maindelle, Owner, Holding The Line Guide Service and Kids Fish, Too! Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide, Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Lake Georgetown Fishing Guide, Walter E. Long (Decker) Lake Fishing Guide. Offering Salado Fishing, Killeen Fishing and Ft. Hood Fishing

Fished a long exploratory trip today hopeful that the rapidly changing conditions brought about by the Lampasas River’s input of flood water hasn’t put the fish off too bad. Here’s how things shaped up today:

A SHOT OF THE TINY SHAD FRY THAT THE PICKY WHITE BASS WERE FEEDING ON THIS MORNING – 5 ARE ARRANGED VERTICALLY BELOW THE HEAD OF THE KEY

Start Time: 6:30a

End Time: 3:30p

Air Temp: 68F at trip’s start with occasional light drizzle.

Water Surface Temp: ~68-69F

Wind: Winds were ESE at ~10 at (obscured) sunrise, slowly increasing to ~17 and steady, and slowly turning into the SSW.

Skies: Skies were entirely clouded grey the entire trip — darker in the AM and brightening in the PM.

Lake Elevation: The lake rose 0.12 feet today, from 620.22 to 620.34 ft. ASL

I launched this morning and spent a lot of time very slowly motored my way downlake just very closely watching the surface for schools of shad and/or white bass lightly feeding on topwater. In the vicinity of Area 159 I noted abundant carp activity. These fish were near the surface and were rolling and surfacing regularly. I also noted a few carp up on the shoreline here as well. Amid the carp activity, I noted occasional, single white bass sipping shad off the surface over open water more distant from the shore. I caught one on a cork rig before moving on to continue the search.

I headed to the shallows between Areas 026 and 222 and again slowly motored while watching my surroundings and sonar. I saw some bottom hugging fish in 16′ in this area and got a slab down among them without result.

I then headed to between Areas 160-205 and felt blessed to find abundant white bass surface feeding activity here at around 8:00am. I again went with the cork rig, got 2 whites and missed a nice largemouth right off the bat, but then continued sight casting to surface feeding fish without result. What I found was a repeat of a situation I encountered around this time last year. These white bass were feeding at the surface on shad fry. These fry are extremely small and don’t require a lot of effort to track down, catch, and consume; accordingly, the white bass were not in the classic topwater frenzy, rather, they were feeding in a more relax, slow, easy manner just slurping these small fry in. Since the size of these fry make them essentially impossible to imitate, I experimented with an alternate presentation that would tempt them. I found that very accurately placing the cork rig on feeding fish and then non-aggressively working that back to the boat, thus NOT creating a bunch of commotion allowed for a fish to be caught on nearly every well-placed cast. When the fish disappeared from the surface, a bladebait failed to produce, despite the fact that I could see and keep up with the moving schools after they sounded. I stayed on these fish for 2 hours as they surfaced and disappeared, surfaced and disappeared. By around 10, this action died. I’d taken 31 fish here by this time.

Often when the fish are found at Area 205, they’ll also begin showing up in other predictable places, as well. I headed to the cove in which Area 431 is located and slowly motored, looked, and studied sonar. I didn’t see much going on, but wanted to linger just in case, so I worked a jigwork along the rocks listening and watching. The wind was still SE at this point, leaving the area fairly calm. I looked back in the backwaters and pockets to see if any sunfish had pushed up shallow yet, but saw none. I managed 3 average largemouth on the worm with 2 more missed on the jump, but no signs of white bass materialized, so I moved on.

I then headed to Area 245. The wind was beginning to go SSE and was picking up at this point to about 14-15. I noted regularly appearing schools of shad tightly grouped on bottom, indicating they were defensive. I saw a few gamefish arcs on sonar and so dropped a buoy on the best-looking spot on the spot and went to work. At first, it was like pulling teeth, getting a few small largemouth to perk up, chase and respond to and easing technique. Then, a few white bass entered into the mix, primarily moving through suspended in the bottom 1/3 of the water column. As the action peaked (although still very sluggish) I was catching a mix of whites and black with regularity and also pulled a short crappie and 2 drum. A total of 14 fish came off this area before the action died hard.

I was about to call it a day and was actually packing up the gear and prepping the boat to head back in to the ramp, when very suddenly the wind shifted from SSE to SSW and racheted up about 2-3 mph. A wind shift out of the west is always a fish trigger. I headed down to Area 430 and one quick sonar pass revealed very active fish near and on bottom in ~24-27′. I got positioned over these fish, got a slab down and they immediately started pounding the slab, despite the fairly silty, olive-drab water. In the next ninety minutes I added 33 fish to the tally. This congregation of fish included a number of year groups from 1-4 years, ranging from 7 to 15 inches in length. By around 3:15p this action was tailing off, so I packed it up for good.

For the 24 hour period of this day, the lake rose 0.12 feet and is still ~1.6 feet below full pool.

TALLY = 82 FISH, all caught and released

Bob Maindelle, Owner, Holding The Line Guide Service and Kids Fish, Too! Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide, Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Lake Georgetown Fishing Guide, Walter E. Long (Decker) Lake Fishing Guide. Offering Salado Fishing, Killeen Fishing and Ft. Hood Fishing

April followed its typical pattern seeing the last white bass head up the tributaries as the majority of the fish headed back and hit the main lake areas hungry. We began to see the first bit of topwater as a result. The big news toward the end of the month was a massive slug of water coming into the lakes from heavy rains to the NW in the Leon and Adamsville areas. These rains really chewed up the water and brought an end to the very consistent fishing in the MacGregor Park area at Belton and the Cedar Gap area at Stillhouse. The rise of water timed very well with the threadfin shad spawn on both lakes and will insure a good bunch of forage for the year to come.

As the graphs show, we boated 784 fish across 13 trips, thus averaging 60 fish per trip.

Bob Maindelle, Owner, Holding The Line Guide Service and Kids Fish, Too! Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide, Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Lake Georgetown Fishing Guide, Walter E. Long (Decker) Lake Fishing Guide. Offering Salado Fishing, Killeen Fishing and Ft. Hood Fishing

Fished a very short 1.5 hour trip this evening just to see if I could keep up with the fish movement with the massive load of water that came into the lake today.

A GRAPH SHOWING THE RAPID INFLUX OF WATER FROM THE LAMPASAS RIVER DUE TO FLOODING IN THE HEADWATERS NEAR ADAMSVILLE

As the graph below shows, we had a rapid 3 foot rise in elevation between 2am and 2pm today, with the water still continuing to rise but at a slower rate after that. There are massive rafts of dead timber in the Lampasas River, in the river mouth, and near and beyond the FM2484 bridge. The debris field tapers off nearly the new water plant construction to the W. of Union Grove. The water is opaque brown from the river to the Union Grove dog-leg turn.

Start Time: 7:00p

End Time: 8:30p

Air Temp: 74F at trip’s start with occasional light drizzle.

Water Surface Temp: ~68-69F

Wind: Winds were SE at ~10

Skies: Skies were entirely clouded grey the entire trip with some spitting drizzle.

Lake Elevation: The lake rose 3.45 feet today, from 616.50 to 619.95 ft. ASL

I got out just before (obscured) sunset today mainly just to see how the water conditons looked, where the turbid water had extended to, and where the debris field had drifted to.

Once I satisfied my curiosity, I ran sonar on some areas that typically hold fish a little later into May and early June, knowing that the whites were going to be forced out of that dirty water uplake.

I was pleasantly surprised to find a strong school of whites settled in at Area 429. As I worked this area over, terns and Bonaparte gulls began to feed in and around this area in the fairly choppy water. Looking closely, I could see small packs of 3-4 white bass driving threadfin shad of ~2.5″ in length to the surface. I switched from my traditional 3/8 oz. TNT 180 slab to the 3/4 oz. TNT 180 and worked these fish over for the short span of time I had from finding them until dark. Because this was over 23-25′, the action rose off the bottom as light diminished. By trip’s end, I was throughing a bright bladebait just subsurface and reeling slowly for the last 3 of the 25 fish I landed tonight.

My catch at this one location included 24 white bass, all 11-12 inches, and a single, pale, largemouth going right at 17 inches.

For the 24 hour period of this day, the lake rose 3.45 feet and is still ~2.05 feet below full pool.

TALLY = 25 FISH, all caught and released

Bob Maindelle, Owner, Holding The Line Guide Service and Kids Fish, Too! Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide, Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Lake Georgetown Fishing Guide, Walter E. Long (Decker) Lake Fishing Guide. Offering Salado Fishing, Killeen Fishing and Ft. Hood Fishing

Fished a very short 2 hour trip this evening after looking at the NOAA weather website and seeing the heavy rains that fell today in the Lampasas River watershed. I expect the lake will rise significantly, but don’t know about water clarity, so I wanted to see exactly where the fish were in their downlake movement following spawning so I could know where to pick up the search after the floodwaters reach us.

Start Time: 6:10p

End Time: 8:15p

Air Temp: 72F at trip’s start with occasional light drizzle.

Water Surface Temp: ~68-69F

Wind: Winds were W at ~7-8

Skies: Skies were clearing from W to E

Environmental Note: We got 0.75 inches of rain at the house today

After a real nice visit with (always helpful) Chuck Guthrie over at Tightlines to look over and update the software on my new Humminbird Side Imaging Sonar unit, I was driving home along the Lampasas River and noted that the winds were coming out of the W. on clearing skies after a day of rain and SE winds.

I hoped to capitalize on the windshift and really quickly got the boat in the water and headed out.

I encountered significant white bass activity as far downlake as Area 349. At this location, I began slabbing after seeing fish both on and just off of bottom on sonar. The fish were acting very quirky. They’d ignore my jigged slab time and time again, yet, once one hit and was hooked, 3-4 schoolmates would come off bottom with it and I could typically drop back down and pick off another fish from the still active pack. This happened 4-5 times and I wound up with 8 fish here and moved on.

I headed to Area 418 and found some shallow fish in ~16 feet of water here. These fish were also behaving oddly — just as at the previous location. I picked up 4 more fish on the slab (3/8 oz. TNT 180) and then heard the first of what would be about 40 minutes worth of spotty topwater activity. From that point, I switched over to a bladebait and chased topwater schools of whites until they were done for good, adding just 10 fish to the tally due to the spread of the fish and small size of the schools encountered.

TALLY = 24 FISH, all caught and released

Bob Maindelle, Owner, Holding The Line Guide Service and Kids Fish, Too! Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide, Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Lake Georgetown Fishing Guide, Walter E. Long (Decker) Lake Fishing Guide. Offering Salado Fishing, Killeen Fishing and Ft. Hood Fishing