This morning I fished with Don K. and his friend, John. These fellows are partners in crime and buddies in retirement! They drove down from Dallas to fish with me today after winning a trip I’d offered to the American Fisheries Society’s fundraiser last year.

Don boated our largest fish of the trip – this 6.00 pound largemouth fell for a live shad on a flat in about 25 feet of water.

John took our largest hybrid of the day, also on a live shad.





It was a really nice day to be outside today. A long-sleeved shirt was sufficient dress for the mid-60 degree weather, we had some nice, grey cloud cover and the winds were manageable all morning.

As we got underway this morning I began to search between Area 903 and 1129. I regularly saw what I suspected were white bass both tight to bottom and suspended up as much as 3 feet off bottom, so, as I searched for large concentrations of fish, we put both downriggers down to give us a shot at hooking up as I continued searching. We boated 9 white bass before coming upon an area that looked like it would produce some hybrid on live shad.

Evidently a bet was placed in the parking lot concerning first fish and largest fish. Controversy immediately broke out when the first fish caught was a sub-legal white bass. There was evidently a question as to whether a fish not meeting the minimum legal length of that species qualified for the first fish prize at all. Next, more controversy broke out concerning the amount that was wagered. The truth laid somewhere between $1 and $20. Yet more controversy broke out when Don landed what we felt would be the biggest fish of the trip — a 6.00 pound largemouth (and personal best of that species for him), but John claimed that because this was a hybrid striper trip, Don’s largemouth was “by-catch” and did not qualify for the prize. And so it went … all in good fun!!

At Area 1186 we put the boat into a hover and put out 4 downlines baited with shad of various sizes. Over the next hour we steadily caught fish until the sun briefly broke through the clouds and the breeze temporarily died, thus squashing the bite for a while. We picked up 9 hybrid, a crappie, a 6.00 pound largemouth and a number of white bass here for our efforts.

We moved on around 9:30 to Area 098. White bass were tightly schooled right on bottom here and sonar did not indicate hybrid mixed in, so, we vertically jigged slabs for these fish and did well for about a 15 minute span before these fish drifted off.

We were fortunate at that same time to spot a mixture of diving terns and gulls spread between Areas 1187 and 1188. We idled into the action, saw very aggressively feeding fish chasing bait up to within a few feet of the surface and used a smoking tactic to take advantage of this aggression. While Don and John worked the slabs, I set out just a single downline baited with shad using some of our larger baitfish hoping to cull a few larger hybrid out of the melee beneath us. We were able to add a number of additional legal hybrid to our catch while literally boating white bass after white bass after white bass for about 90 minutes.

We finished our day with a nice mixed bag which included white bass, hybrid striper, crappie and largemouth.

Over the course of the day we traded opinions on fishing gear, fish recipes, best places to go for certain species, and more. Fellows, thanks for coming out with me, and thank you both for your service to the nation in the U.S. Air Force.

TALLY = 118 fish, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS:

Start Time: 7:30a

End Time: 12:30p

Air Temp: 63F at trip’s start

Water Surface Temp: ~59-61F

Wind: Winds were S7-8, shifting suddenly to WNW12-13 by 10:30a

Skies: Skies were grey but still bright.

This morning I fished with John and Kelly M. of Temple, and their teenaged son, Matthew.

John took this really nice 13.75 inch white crappie out of 38 feet of water from amongst a large school of smallish white bass.

L to R — Matthew, Kelly, and John with a few of the nice fish we took on bladebaits early in the day.





Matthew is an all-sports fan and has a fascination with statistics, so, it was most fitting today, after he’s kept close watch on my “fishing scoreboard” via Facebook, that he and his family took the lead in the “most fish caught” standings for this calendar year so far.

Our winds returned from the south today and built to over 15mph, AND we had some nice, grey cloud cover. That is perfect white bass weather and, as a result, we wound up boating exactly 152 fish on this half-day outing.

We started the day off with mostly clear skies, but a cloud bank from the north moved in quickly and obscured the sun within an hour of sunrise. While the sun was shining, but still low in the morning sky we flatline trolled with crankbaits in the vicinity of Area 116 in 12-16 feet of water and picked up a total of 9 fish (8 white bass and 1 crappie) in just 3 passes before bird activity caught our attention and took us to better action.

We spotted 3 gulls, 3 herons, and an osprey, all looking “fishy” over a patch of water between Areas 741 and 742. When we idled in, sonar clearly showed abundant white bass spread throughout this area. As things settled down, we witnessed white bass forcing schools of shad to the surface on occasion. This was in 8-14 feet of water, so, I opted to go with a horizontal approach fan-casting bladebaits until we connected, and then saturating productive areas as long as they would produce. Over a 90 minute span, we boated an additional 44 fish here. 90% of these fish were beefy, 13-14+ inch long white bass.

After the shallow bite died, we went looking deep along the old Lampasas River channel. After a bit of searching, we found fish with sonar in ~38 feet of water between Areas 074 and 1017. We arrived at this area at 10:30a, caught fish on the very first drop of our slabs, and kept right on catching fish through 12:15p — nearly 2 solid hours. Most of these fish were small, but what they lacked in size, they made up for in abundance. In all, we pulled 98 fish off this area including 97 white bass and 1 white crappie, which taped at 13.75 inches in length. Every last fish here was taken on a TNT180 white slab fished vertically. We did occasionally nab one on an “easing” tactic, but these fish were reluctant to leave bottom very far behind.

Not much else to report! We essentially fished 3 places, and every last one of them produced today. Minimal time was spent searching for fish as they were up and feeding and readily located given the very favorable conditions we encountered.

TALLY = 152 fish, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS:

Start Time: 7:30a

End Time: 1:00p

Air Temp: 54F at trip’s start

Water Surface Temp: ~63-64F

Wind: Winds were S7 building to SSE17+

Skies: Skies were grey but still bright.

In the wake of some mild thunderstorms and about 1/10th of an inch of rainfall overnight, we awoke to a clear, cool, bright morning. I welcomed Ken C., his wife, Kris, Kris’ sister, Angie, and Angie’s son, sixteen year old Andrew, aboard for some white bass fishing on Stillhouse.

L to R — Ken, Kris, Andrew, and Angie with the “best of the bunch” from our catch of white bass today.

Kris boated this nice 2 pounder from deep water on a slab.

Ken and Kris have fished with me once before in the summer months when downrigging was in vogue. Today, early flatline trolling followed by deepwater jigging was the name of the game. Angie and Andrew were down on Spring Break from the Kansas City, KS, area. I think we were all hoping for some warmer weather than we got this morning, so we took the lemons and made some lemonade.

As we got started, we flatline trolled with crankbaits in 12-16 feet of water near Area 116. We scored with 9 fish landed out of 12 fish hooked over the first hour or so. When that shallow bite died, we headed deep looking for congregated fish to jig for.

We encountered deep, congregated fish in two distinct areas: Area 1017/1172 and Area 638/639. At both locations the fish were in ~38 feet, tightly bunched and fed with only moderate aggressiveness. Technique is incredibly important when fish get tight-lipped and with the wind, boat movement and all 4 guests very new to this tactic, technique was difficult to maintain, but we did it.

For our efforts we managed to boat a grand total of 54 fish, including the four shown in the photo above, all of which beat the 13.5″ mark. 52 of these fish were white bass and the remaining 2 were largemouth bass. We got no assistance today from the birds; all the deepwater fish were found “the hard way” via sonar search.

TALLY = 54 fish, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS:

Start Time: 7:30a

End Time: 1:00p

Air Temp: 52F at trip’s start

Water Surface Temp: ~63F

Wind: Winds were NNE8 building to NE14

Skies: Skies were clear and bluebird.

This fifth day of Spring Break 2013 (Friday, 15 March) I was joined in the afternoon by Jerry W. of Harker Heights, and twin brothers Daniel and Steven K., both now in their early twenties, whom Jerry has come to know through his ministry to young people.

L to R — Daniel, Jerry, and Steven with just a sampling of the 101 fish that tore up our slabs this evening.

We had an interesting crew aboard today. Jerry, an insurance agent and youth/young adult minister, was the ring leader, keeping things stirred up by regularly and quite audibly announcing to Steven and Daniel whenever he caught a fish, thus making good on his promise at the trip’s beginning to outfish them both. Steven was our young combat veteran and U.S. Army chaplain’s assistant just back from Afghanistan; his motto was “under-promise, over-deliver”, including promises made to self; thus, he set his sights on catching up to as many as 6 fish today so he could then handsomely exceed his goal. And Daniel was our penniless, professional student, existing on a diet of mainly ramen noodles and wearing shirts apparently borrowed from homeless people. He also served as Jerry’s auxiliary conscience, regularly asking questions like, “Does you wife know you are eating that?”. And so it was … my job was to take this rag-tag group of individuals and form them into a highly efficient, fish-catching team in under 5 hours.

Today’s trip unfolded much in the same was most of this week’s afternoon trips have — it started slowly, followed by a solid deep-water bite from 5:30 to 7:00p, then followed by a mid-depth 20-28 foot feet just minutes before sunset.

We searched with sonar for nearly all of our first hour on the water, initially making contact with a small school of white bass at Area 088. We slabbed for these fish in 27-29 feet of water and pulled 17 fish of various lengths before the bite went sour.

Next, we headed to open water and found a large congregation of fish on Area 946. The majority of these fish were small, but the action was consistent and everyone was having so much fun poking fun at each other, the steady action seemed just to be a backdrop to the camaraderie. Daniel pulled a nice 2.00 pound largemouth from this area, and everyone caught a few fish which were photo-worth. Steven hooked into a very nice fish — not sure if it was a big catfish or largemouth — but it ran hard for timber and made it before Steven could turn it and we lost our shot at that one. Every trip needs a “big one that got away” story, right? We wound up boating 77 fish here and hooked and lost quite a few more.

As the sun fell to within 20 minutes of setting, we made a final move to Area 067. I’d encountered a really strong pre-sunset bite in this vicinity the night before, so we headed here to see if a pattern would emerge, and it did. We arrived at this area with a tally of 94 fish; everyone had their sights set on making that 100 fish mark. No sooner did we establish a hover than we were into fish on our TNT180 slabs used in both a jigging and an easing tactic. Steven carried the day for us here, putting 3 of the 6 fish we needed to make the century mark in the boat in no time flat. Everyone soon chipped in and, by dark, the count stood at 101!

TALLY = 101 fish, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS:

Start Time: 3:30p

End Time: 7:45p

Air Temp: 76F at trip’s start

Water Surface Temp: ~58F

Wind: Winds were S17 tapering to S9

Skies: Skies were fair and cloudless.

This fifth day of Spring Break 2013 I was joined in the morning by Jim D. of Mississippi, his son-in-law, John Mark, of McGregor,Texas, and Jim’s 12 year old grandson, John (J.J.).

L to R – John Mark, young John, and Grandpa Jim with John’s morning catch. The larger of John’s 2 white bass taped at 14 3/8 inches and was taken on a crankbait.

This trip was Grandpa Jim’s Spring Break treat to his grandson, so, only young John did the fishing today while Dad and Grandpa looked on, encouraged, and cheered.

We got on fish immediately, finding fish active enough to run down a trolled crankbait in shallow water off Area 116. We took 16 fish in this manner before active, diving terns told us to change our game plan.

We therefore headed out to deeper water hoping for big groups of clustered fish, but, only found small packs of 2-5 fish here, there, and everywhere. So, we downrigged for these fish using tandem-rigged Pet Spoons and came up with 5 fish, including a double-double (2 fish on both rods = 4 fish caught at the same time). This action took place between Area 052 and Area 1158. After catching that foursome, we noted a concentration of fish on bottom where we’d caught these from and circled back to try our first vertical jigging of the day; this yielded only 2 fish. By now a nice SSW wind had developed at 8-9 mph.

As the jigging action played out, we headed to Area 1183 and both jigged and cast bladebaits to add another 9 fish to our count, taking our tally up to 32 fish. We’d now fished for 3 1/4 hours and the novelty was wearing off a bit for John, but, he decided he could hang tough for one more stop to try some jigging again in deep water. We made it worth his while, boating a final 4 fish in just about as many minutes, thus giving him a favorable final impression of the day’s adventure.

TALLY = 35 fish, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS:

Start Time: 7:45a

End Time: 11:45a

Air Temp: 58F at trip’s start

Water Surface Temp: ~58F

Wind: Winds were SSW8-10

Skies: Skies were fair and cloudless.

This fourth day of Spring Break 2013 I was joined in the afternoon by Dr. Dan D. and his 15 year old son, Jason, of San Antonio, TX.

Dan boated this long 6.00 pound flathead catfish from amidst an aggressively feeding white bass school in 38 feet of water.

Jason caught this 2.00 pound largemouth and the white bass just feet away from where Dan hooked his big catfish.

As the sun set and the shadows got long, we experienced a short blitz of white bass action allowing us to put 59 white bass, most of this quality, in the boat in under an hour.





Dan and Jason no sooner concluded a morning flyfishing outing for trout on the Guadalupe River than they sped north to link up with me this afternoon for some conventional tackle fishing for white bass on Stillhouse.

As most afternoon trips this time of year do, this trip started off a bit slow, then built as we moved towards sunset.

Before leaving the ramp area, we went over in detail exactly how to vertical jig with a slab, as I expected most, if not all, of our trip would involve this tactic.

We first connected with a few fish on a gentle breakline near the old river channel at Area 1185. These fish were sluggish and appeared in small clusters of 3-5 fish each, so, this made for some slow going, but, it also allowed us to boat some fish during a typically slow time of day AND to really polish up our jigging technique. We boated 17 fish in this area before moving on.

With their slabbing skills now honed, we moved on to Area 1038 and found a large school of smallish fish right at the break into the old river channel on the extreme NW portion of this topographic feature. We went to work with our slabs and, over the next 90 minutes, put an additional 35 fish in the boat including a few 12 inch white bass, a 2 pound largemouth, and a 6 pound yellow catfish. By 6:45p this area had played out.

I went looking over a few other areas adjacent to the river channel but saw little. Then, in the distance, I saw a few terns working anxiously over a fair spread of water. They were definitely looking “fishy”. As I idled about beneath the area (Area 1184) where the terns were working, the bottom literally lit up with white bass — they were all over this place, from bottom and upward to as much as 4-5 feet above the bottom. I did my best to hover us in place over what appeared to be the “center of mass” for this action and the game was on! We sat in one spot and more than doubled our catch in less than 50 minutes, taking our tally from 52 fish up to 111 fish. We used only a moderately-paced smoking tactic here. Jigging was not necessary as these fish were neither sluggish nor bottom-oriented.

Now, about those green eggs … it’s not what you’re thinking. “Green Eggs” are actually some new-fangled form of grill which use ceramic material to retain heat and provide a consistent cooking temperature over time. There is evidently a “Green Egg Grill” convention in Salado this weekend and Dan and Jason are pairing up to cook some samples and enjoy the festivities planned at Pace’s Park.

TALLY = 111 fish, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS:

Start Time: 3:30p

End Time: 7:45p

Air Temp: 72F at trip’s start

Water Surface Temp: ~58F

Wind: Winds were SSW10-13

Skies: Skies were fair and cloudless.

Environmental Note: Noted first mayflies hatching today and first mass “rise” of insect life off the bottom at sunrise tonight.

This fourth day of Spring Break 2013 I was joined by Tom S. of Dallas, his son, Jack, and Jack’s friend, Jake, both age 17.

Jack with two of the nicer fish we boated on blade baits cast horizontally this morning.

Tom with a TPWD Big Fish Award winner. That fat white bass on the left measured 15.25 inches.

Jake was pretty new to fishing, but is an athlete, so, his coordination kicked in after a bit of coaching and he held his own on what was a new adventure for him today.





Sometimes a fishing trip is a nicety, other times, it is a necessity. I’d rank this trip in the “necessity” category. Spring Break has not been easy on Tom and his clan — Tom suspects his new Lab puppy of burying his wallet earlier this week with cash, cards, ID, and fishing license. Next, Jack’s car got a “free towing package” awarded to it as it sat at a Subway while he and Jake attended Six Flags in Arlington, and, to top it all off, they all got a major runaround from a major outdoor retailer while trying to get Jake his license for this trip. By the time they got to the boat ramp after an early morning 3+ hour drive from DFW, they NEEDED to catch some fish for therapeutic purposes!!

We made “first contact” with fish today using downriggers between Area 052 and 335 over a 20-25 foot flat. Terns showed us the way to the fish, but the fish were widely scattered in small clusters, so, we covered ground in a hurry with the ‘riggers and wound up boating 21 fish in our first 70 minutes, including 3 sets of doubles, all on Pet Spoons.

Next, we headed to Area 1183 and found white bass feeding aggressively along the bottom at a breakline from ~17 to 25 feet of water. I saw these fish were stacked vertically on the drop and dispersed horizontally up on the flat in this area, so, we first “smoked” slabs vertically for the fish directly beneath us, and then cast blade baits and worked them near bottom to coax the fish on the flat into striking. We put 26 fish in the boat in this area, most of which went 13.5 to 14.5 inches, with one fish Tom boated going exactly 15.25 inches, thus qualifying him for a TPWD “Big Fish” Award.

By around 12:30 things were beginning the downhill slide toward the midday pause in action between the morning bite and evening bite. We tried one last stop at Area 074 and, with very little showing on sonar, managed to put a final 5 fish in the boat, all via a vertical jigging approach.

TALLY = 52 fish, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS:

Start Time: 8:15a

End Time: 1:15p

Air Temp: 50F at trip’s start

Water Surface Temp: ~57-58F

Wind: Winds were SSW10-13

Skies: Skies were fair and cloudless.

This third day of Spring Break 2013 I was joined by The Holeman’s — Grandpa Gary, his son, Rick, Rick’s wife, Cylena, and Rick and Cylena’s daughter, McCartney — all from the Midland area where Gary works in the oil business and Rick pastors Cotton Flat Baptist Church.

Fishing was the “main event” for the Holeman’s Spring Break camping trip this year.

Cylena boated the trip’s largest fish today — a nice largemouth that was hanging out with a big school of white bass down around 38 feet.

This was a really fun trip for me today. This was a great, close-knit, godly family who clearly enjoyed being with one another. McCartney, age 13, had never been on a guided trip before, so, this was her first experience with that and, fortunately, the weather and fish both cooperated to make it a memorable one.

As is often the case on bright, cool days, we found our fish up shallow early on, and out deeper later in the trip.

We did a bit of flatline trolling with crankbaits to kick the morning off as it was nearly windless and no birds were yet working. We picked up two nice white bass off of Area 116 and were about to put the baits back out when we spotted some terns working over fish. We headed to them (in the vicinity of Area 557). We got into our vertical jigging mode (which we’d practiced earlier) and began to pull fish. We put an additional 17 fish in the boat here out of 19 feet of water before the action dried up on us.

Next, we headed to Area 055/995 and found a few packs of fish in and around this location in ~25 feet of water. These fish were a bit reluctant, but, we worked them over with the jigging spoons pretty well and wound up leaving this area with a tally of 37 fish.

By 10:30, the SE wind was building and the sun was getting higher, so, I decided to head deep and check some haunts further downlake. We hit paydirt at Area 1039/981 in about 38 feet of water. Over the next 2 hours we caught fish steadily from within a foot of the bottom. There were a number of times when, with 4-5 rods going, we had 2, 3, or 4 fish coming aboard at the same time.

We had fun hitting “milestones” of 50 fish, then 61 (the highest previous fish count for this Spring Break week), then 100, then 122 (double the highest previous fish count for the week), until we finally came to rest at 130. It was almost 1pm and the fish were getting fewer and further between, plus, we discovered Grandma H. had been waiting in the parking lot for over and hour!

So, we took some good photos and headed back in to the boat ramp, with some much more accomplished anglers aboard than we had left the dock with just a few hours earlier.

Thank you all for coming out fishing with me!

TALLY = 130 fish, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS:

Start Time: 7:45a

End Time: 12:45p

Air Temp: 48F at trip’s start

Water Surface Temp: ~57F

Wind: Winds were SE8-9

Skies: Skies were fair and cloudless.

This second day of Spring Break 2013 I was joined in the evening by Andy and Trent M. of N. Austin.

Trent took big fish honors tonight with this 4.5 pound largemouth vertical jigged from out of 55 feet of water amidst a huge school of white bass.

Andy and Trent landed this pair of schoolie largemouth just seconds apart from a deep rockpile in 50 feet of water.

We zigged when we should have zigged this afternoon. We left the boat launch and were literally into fish less than 4 minutes later as the sonar showed the bottom over top of Area 1039/981 littered with fish. We got baits in the water, slabs on bottom, and up came the fish. At this first stop, we pulled 17 fish in very short order before the fish quit kind of abruptly. I’ve seen this on occasion when a school of big predator fish (longnose gar or outsized largemouth) come in and crash the party. Regardless, what started quickly ended just as quickly and we were off again to find fish.

Our next success came at Area 946 in about 55 feet of water. Again, as I idled over the area with sonar on, the bottom was just crawling with white bass here. These were very active, aggressive fish as indicated by their willingness to rise up to our falling slabs as we lowered our baits, and by the fishes’ tendency to follow hooked schoolmates almost 2/3’s of the way to the surface before turning back for the safety of the bottom. Since these fish were a bit smallish, we agreed we’d put 20 in the boat and then go looking elsewhere. This took all of about 7 minutes and we were on our way looking in some similar deepwater areas, but came up clean, so, we returned to Area 946 to fish until the shadows were long enough to lead me to believe that we could find some fish up shallow to cast for. By the time we left, we’d brought our tally up to 61 fish.

With about 30 minutes to go until sunset, we headed uplake and looked in some shallower (<25') areas for schooled white bass, but, tonight found little. With the air getting colder, Trent's sweatshirt seemed to be getting thinner, so, we called it a great afternoon with 61 fish boated and headed for the dock and some burgers on the grill.

TALLY = 61 fish, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS:

Start Time: 4:35a

End Time: 7:45p

Air Temp: 68F at trip’s start

Water Surface Temp: ~56-57F

Wind: Winds were ESE13

Skies: Skies were fair and cloudless.

This second day of Spring Break 2013 I was joined by Dolph M. and one of his grandsons, Grayson, of Circle C, Texas.

Grandpa Dolph and Grayson sharing some time together, catching fish, enjoying the great outdoors, (and eating some BIG muffins).

I first got to know Dolph last year when he brought another batch of grandkids (from Los Angeles, CA) out for some hybrid fishing on Lake Belton.

Grayson is 12 years old and really did well today. Depth control is really the name of the game on these cold, bottom-hugging fish and Grayson did well at making sure his presentation was exactly where it needed to be.

This year, with a lighter load of passengers, Dolph joined in on the fishing instead of just chaperoning as he did last time. We caught a good bunch of fish today for our efforts (and had some awesome muffins, weighing in at about 3 pounds a piece)!

We found fish at 6 different locations this morning and, due to the still-low water temperatures (56-57F) wound up vertical jigging for every last one of the fish we boated. We enjoyed success up shallow (15-22 feet) early on and then, due to bright, clear skies, found our mid- to late-morning fish out deeper (35-40 feet). Birds were helpful to some degree, although very distracted by loon and cormorant action now. We found fish at Areas 052, 101/330, and 372 early and shallow. We found fish at 1180, 1181, and 1182 deeper later in the morning.

After a total of 5 hours on the water, we’d boated at total of 59 fish, including 4 crappie, 5 largemouth bass, 1 drum and 49 white bass.

TALLY = 59 fish, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS:

Start Time: 7:45a

End Time: 12:45p

Air Temp: 47F at trip’s start

Water Surface Temp: ~56-57F

Wind: Winds were S9-11

Skies: Skies were fair and cloudless.