2015 Fishing Reports | Fishing Report

The Skipper’s in Shimski — 105 Fish, SKIFF Trip #2015 – Stillhouse Hollow

May 16th, 2015May 21st, 2015 by Bob Maindelle

This morning I conducted the fourth SKIFF trip of the 2015 season, treating Austin Bayless, age 12, and his sister, Chloe Bayless, age 6, to a free fishing trip on Stillhouse Hollow while their dad, U.S. Army Captain Wyatt Bayless, is away on assignment to the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, California.

Austin Bayless displays our largest fish of the morning — a nice largemouth bass that fell for a jigging spoon. It weighed in at 3.25 pounds on a certified scale.

Mrs. Jennifer Bayless dropped the kids off at lakeside promptly at 7am and, after a short safety briefing, we were on our way to hunt for fish. Mrs. Bayless was going to use the time without kids to get the house squared away for Wyatt’s return this coming week, after a ~5 week absence. By mid July this family will “PCS” (made a permanent change of station) away from Ft. Hood to San Antonio where CPT Bayless will work with ROTC cadets at the University of Texas — San Antonio for a 3-year tour.

We started off downrigging in the low light created by the heavy cloud cover, and picked up 8 white bass of various sizes on our Pet Spoons before spotting a large school of fish holding tight to the bottom after about 40 minutes of trolling. We used the Spot Lock feature on the Minn Kota Ulterra trolling motor to hold right on top of these fish for over 3 hours. As soon as we got our lures down amongst the fish, they responded aggressively, thus allowing for a “smoking” tactic to be employed. As we reeled fish in, most every time I observed several other fish from the school chasing the hooked fish up from the bottom. At one point in time, one of these “chasers” got a bit too close to his buddy and got hooked, thus allowing Austin to bring in a double!

At age 6, Chloe’s attention span lasted about 2 1/2 hours, and after that we had to find some other jobs she was interested in. Her favorite was “net-girl”. I equipped her with my live bait net and, each time Austin or I landed a fish, I would unhook it, deposit it in Chloe’s waiting net, and she would (quite ceremoniously) deposit it back into the lake on the side of the boat opposite Austin and me. When the novelty of that wore off, I gave her my “thumping stick” — a device I use to tap on the bottom of the boat to create commotion and attract fish. She belted out a couple nice rhythms and kept the fish consolidated underneath us quite nicely. Finally, when the novelty wore off on that task, we took to creating boat titles for ourselves. Austin’s vast knowledge of nautical lingo kicked in here, and he helped us determine that I would be serving as ‘skipper’, he would be the ‘first matey’, and Chloe would be the ‘deck hand’. Too many ‘Wicked Tuna’ episodes I reckon.

Somehow, we got on the topic of the zebra mussel invasion of Lake Belton. I explained how the larval stage of this invasive species can be transported by water in a boat’s bilge or livewell, and how, if a lake gets infected, damage can result to the balance of that lake’s ecosystem. Austin said, “So the zebra mussels can put a lake in some deep ‘shimski’?” I knew he meant ‘kimchi”, but I asked, “Shimski, huh?” He replied, “Yeah, that’s something my PaPa says.”

There were no dull moments this morning!!

SKIFF (Soldiers’ Kids Involved in Fishing Fun) trips are provided free of charge to families whose children are separated from a parent due to that parent’s military service, thanks to the Austin Fly Fishers and a network of supportive individuals from all over the U.S. All it takes is a phone call from a parent to me at 254-368-7411 to reserve a date.

A huge thanks to all the supporters of SKIFF nationwide! If you have donated money, donated gear, provided “Outdoor Professional” discounts to us, conducted fundraisers, referred children or their parents to SKIFF, arranged for publicity, or for whatever else you may have done, seen or unseen, — THANK YOU!

TALLY = 105 FISH, all caught and released (103 white bass, 1 drum, 1 largemouth bass)

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:00a

End Time: 11:00a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 72F

Water Surface Temp: 73F

Wind Speed & Direction: SSE11-12 the entire trip

Sky Conditions: 100% cloud cover.

Note: Lake has risen ~2 feet since last Sunday but has not discolored or seen a lot of flotsam come in

Other: GT= 0

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1563-1564

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Transition Underway — 26 Fish, Belton Lake, 14 May 2015

May 14th, 2015 by Bob Maindelle

This morning I fished on Belton Lake with returning guests Ken Wilkins of Tex-Mix Concrete and Tony Bagliore of Tony Bagliore Concrete.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMER

Ken took our best fish of the trip this morning — this smallmouth bass that hit a large, live threadfin shad fished at 35′ over a 40 foot bottom. It weighed in at 3.00 pounds on a certified scale.

The annual spring hybrid bite tied to the spawning of the threadfin shad is now past peak. One of the signs of this is a reduced occurrence of shad spawning in the shallows, and the appearance of young of the year shad (often pursued by white bass) on the surface of the reservoir. Both of these signs were evident today.

I was able to net enough shad for today’s trip, albeit with more effort required than for any other trip thus far this season.

We fished a number of areas today from as shallow as 18 feet to as deep as 40 feet, but never really experienced a solid feed where the fish got excited and competitive and “turned on” to our live baits well. As often happens when the bite is tentative, we had a rather high number of “pull downs” that failed to result in boated fish. Often this is due to technique, but that wasn’t the case today, as both Tony and Ken are experienced in the use of circle hooks.

We boated a mixed bag today consisting of hybrid striped bass, smallmouth bass, largemouth bass, white bass, blue catfish, and a single spotted bass.

I’m officially closing out the Spring 2015 chapter of live bait fishing for another season and will now begin to pursue fish strictly on artificial baits, spending a majority of the time on Stillhouse.

TALLY = 26 FISH, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:15a

End Time: 1:00p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 72F

Water Surface Temp: 73.2F

Wind Speed & Direction: Light SE2-3mph for the entire trip

Sky Conditions: 100% cloud cover.

Note: White bass feeding on YOY shad in most of Leon arm.

Other: GT=100

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 691

**Area 1560

**Area 509

**Area 1561-1562

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

This is Exciting! — 13 Fish, Belton Lake, 07 May 2015

May 7th, 2015May 9th, 2015 by Bob Maindelle

This morning I fished on Belton Lake with 7-year-old Rachel Ansley and her PaPa, Norm Dobias.

Rachel’s largest fish of the trip was this just-legal 18″ hybrid striped bass taken on a live shad set at 27 feet over a deeper bottom.

Rachel’s first fish of the trip was this blue catfish that hit a cut bait. Can you guess what the grandkids call Norm??

And the prettiest fish award goes to … this smallmouth bass!

Norm treated Rachel’s sister to a fishing trip over the winter, and today was Rachel’s turn. Actually, it was Rachel’s turn quite some time ago, but a loved one in Norm’s family passed away on the first date we had scheduled, and one of Norm’s grandchildren was born prematurely, so the family has been spending a lot of time at the hospital.

Rachel is a sweet, friendly, curious young lady who caught on quickly to all I introduced her to on today’s trip, and who asked a lot of good questions about how things work. Her family is a part of Temple Bible Church and homeschools Rachel and her siblings. Thursdays are a scheduled break from bookwork, and usually involve adventures with PaPa Norm.

On today’s trip we experienced a slow start in the first 2.5 hours, and then things picked up a bit during the last 2+ hours on the water. At first we had some difficulty finding fish, and then we had a tough time getting the fish we found to bite. I compared notes with one retired guide, one other guide who was on the water today, and another recreational fisherman, and all reported tough, slow conditions, including difficulty in getting fish they did find to strike baits.

Rachel wound up with a nice variety of fish, including 1 blue catfish, 2 white bass, 1 longear sunfish, 1 smallmouth bass, and and 8 hybrid striped bass.

Nearly every time a fish would take an interest in a live bait and begin pursuing it, we could see this play out by watching the rod tip and sonar. As we did, Rachel would say, “This is exciting!”, referring to the sense of anticipation that the rod was about to go down under the weight of another fish taking our bait.

TALLY = 13 FISH, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:15a

End Time: 11:45a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 68F

Water Surface Temp: 72F on lower lake

Wind Speed & Direction: SE12 for the entire trip

Sky Conditions: 100% heavy cloud cover.

Other: GT=20

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1559

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

We’re Squinting Now! — 29 Fish, Belton Lake, 05 May 2015

May 5th, 2015May 5th, 2015 by Bob Maindelle

This morning I fished with Robert and Karen Spencer on Lake Belton in pursuit of hybrid striped bass. The two have been married for 36 years, and fishing has been a part of their marriage right from the start.

Although our target species was hybrid striped bass, this 2.75 pound Belton Lake smallmouth took the prize for the largest fish boated today.

Largemouth bass made up the majority of our catch today. Easily 60% of our 29 fish catch consisted of this member of the black bass family.

A stiff south east wind was up and blowing before sunrise and stayed consistent at about 14 mph for the duration of the trip. We got going at 8:15 AM and experienced slow fishing for the first 3+ hours. During this time we boated only five fish, including two hybrid striped bass, two white bass, and one smallmouth bass.

Early in the trip I commented to Karen about how dark the skies were with heavy clouds. There is a certain level of light which, when it develops, seems to turn the fish on. I’ve noticed that when it is completely cloudy, but still bright enough to have to squint without sunglasses, or to just need to put sunglasses on, that particular level of light seems to turn the fish on. Indeed, right around 11:45, when the clouds thinned enough and had occasional breaks in them and began to let sunlight through, our results begin to improve substantially.

I extended our trip, and we fished for an additional 2+ hours, over which time we put an additional 24 fish in the boat. These fish all came off of one area and included primarily largemouth bass, with a few smallmouth, hybrid stripers, and white bass mixed in. We were fishing with our baits set at 25 feet over a 32 foot bottom on a gentle slope.

Both Robert and Karen are shooting sport enthusiasts, and so I got to learn a little bit about their hobby as we fished together. I always like to ask people about their favorite past fishing experiences, and this couple did not have to put much thought into recalling their favorite two adventures. The first was an airboat trip for redfish on the Texas Gulf Coast, and the other was a beach fishing trip targeting bull sharks and blacktip sharks which, in addition to the sharks, landed this pair a 6’8″ tarpon as an unexpected bonus. It was interesting to me to learn that the sharks they landed were actually tagged for scientific research and then released.

When all was said and done today, we boated exactly 29 fish. This was a pretty tough day, as is common with strong easterly winds.

TALLY = 29 FISH, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 8:15a

End Time: 2:30p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 67F

Water Surface Temp: 71.9F on lower lake

Wind Speed & Direction: SE14 for the entire trip

Sky Conditions: 100% heavy cloud cover until 11:30, then brightening and reducing to 80% cloud cover

Other: GT=45

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 835

**Area 509

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

TAUNTING! — 14 Fish, Belton Lake, 02 May 2015

May 2nd, 2015 by Bob Maindelle

This morning I fished on Belton Lake with Phil Duff and his 10-year-old grandson, Bishop. Phil’s intent was for Bishop to do all the fishing as he just looked on.

Bishop was treated to this morning’s hybrid striper trip on Belton by his Grams and Grandad Duff.

Grams and Grandad Duff got Bishop a fishing trip gift certificate for Christmas and weather prevented us from redeeming that certificate over Spring Break, so, Bishop has been beyond patient in waiting for this postponement date to roll around.

One of the first things Bishop said following my safety talk and my introduction on how to use the gear was, “You have a lot of stuff on this boat that I’m not familiar with.” So, I invited him to ask all the questions he cared to so he could learn a few things as we waited on the fish.

We got off to a slow first hour fishing a main lake breakline until a call from a fellow fisherman came in letting me know of some willing fish he had found and inviting us to join him. Although the bite was certainly not white-hot, it was steady for about an hour from 8-9 am, allowing us to boat 10 fish and miss a few others.

After this short run was over, we headed back out in search of fish once again, finding a few off the Leon River channel, and boating an additional 3 hybrid stripers and 1 blue catfish. The blue cats have both a distinctive way they bite and way they fight when hooked. Often times, when fishing is slow, the blue cat will “pester” a live shad just enough to kill it, but not fully swallow it, thus avoiding being hooked. When I observed that we had a blue cat messing around in our bait spread, I put on a dead chunk of bait to try to allow Bishop to catch it. I suppose the fish was too small to take the chunk fully in its mouth, as we got a number of pulldowns, but still couldn’t hook the fish. It was then that Bishop exclaimed, “He’s taunting me!”. He then set his mind on catching that fish before we departed. A few minutes later, after baiting up with a smaller chunk of bait, we finally caught that catfish fair and square right in the corner of his mouth.

Without prompting, as we wrapped up our trip, Bishop told his Grandad, “This was fun!”. And with that, we headed back to the boat ramp.

TALLY = 14 FISH, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:00a

End Time: 11:30a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 62F

Water Surface Temp: 72F on lower lake

Wind Speed & Direction: Light and variable until 9:00am, then a southerly breeze began, building to 11-12 mph, then dying back to 7-8mph

Sky Conditions: Fair and 10% cloud cover

Other: GT=20

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1288

**Area 1344

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Flat Calm – 10 Fish, Belton Lake, 01 May 2015

May 1st, 2015 by Bob Maindelle

This morning I fished on Belton Lake with Mr. John Stephenson, Mr. Bob Bearden, Bob’s son, Terry Bearden, and Tucker Glaske.

From left: Tucker Glaske and John Stephenson with one of the hybrid striped bass we boated this morning.

WWII veteran and former prisoner of war Bob Bearden, age 92, hung with the young guns today and boated a few fish himself, including this Belton blue catfish.

John is a U.S. Army veteran who, among other things, served as a Bell County Commissioner several years ago. Bob Bearden is a 92-year old WWII veteran and former prisoner of war. Terry, who works in the off-shore oil industry, is one of Bob’s five children, and Tucker is an assistant director in the the Development Department at the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor, where he focuses on fund-raising.

We had a very tough trip this morning thanks to near-windless conditions and bright, cloudless skies, but, that is from my perspective, knowing that Belton is capable of producing much better, and knowing that we are in a season where high numbers of quality fish are very catchable. Tucker, for example, had an entirely different perspective. He’d been fishing perhaps only 4 other times in his life and had never caught as many fish during those trips as we did today.

Regardless of the mood of the fish, there was good company and good conversation throughout our time on the water.

Bob chided me about all the tactics and gadgets I employed trying to get stubborn fish to come bite our baits this morning, saying I was creating an unfair advantage, and hinting that I might have to give an account to the Lord about all of this taking advantage of His creatures one day. They say the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, but, I’d have to disagree, since Bob’s son, Terry, was all for me using sonar, bait, an automatic trolling motor, acoustic attraction, line-counter reels, audible bait clickers and more to put every last fish we could in the boat that we possibly could!!

When we cranked up the outboard to head in, we’d boated 5 hybrid striped bass, 4 blue catfish, and 1 smallmouth bass.

TALLY = 10 FISH, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:45a

End Time: 11:30a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 65F

Water Surface Temp: 72F on lower lake

Wind Speed & Direction: Light and variable

Sky Conditions: Fair and cloudless

Other: GT=0

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 346

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Oh, for a Little Wind — 35 Fish, Belton, 30 April 2015

May 1st, 2015 by Bob Maindelle

This morning I fished on Belton Lake with Mr. Rick Klein, his son, Doug, and Rick’s friend, Randy Pritchett.

Rick took this, his largest fish of the day, in the closing minutes of the trip as the wind, which had gone slack, finally kicked in from the SE.

Randy Pritchett caught these hybrid back-to-back; one on the live bait rod he was tending to, and the other on a cut-bait rod we had setup next to it. As I took the first fish off and Randy was standing by, the second rod went down just seconds later.

Doug Klein took this nice crappie on a live shad fished at 27 feet over a 38 foot bottom.

In my “day-before-the-trip” note to Rick I stated, “If you are a man of faith, pray for some wind!”. The forecast for this day showed very low wind speeds and very low cloud coverage. Bright, calm conditions are always very tough on Belton. The fish we caught were caught mainly in the first half of the trip when a gentle west wind was blowing, and then again towards the end of the trip when an even lighter SE breeze kicked in after the breeze stopped altogether in the middle of the trip.

We caught a variety of fish on live shad today including hybrid striped bass, largemouth bass, blue catfish, white bass, and crappie.

I appreciated Doug’s comment that he learned a lot on today’s trip as I answered his questions about gear, methods, fish behavior, and more.

TALLY = 35 FISH, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 8:30a

End Time: 1:30p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 58F

Water Surface Temp: 71F on lower lake; 72-73F in upper Leon River

Wind Speed & Direction: W5, dying and shifting to SE3-4

Sky Conditions: Fair and cloudless

Other: GT=45

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 346/976

**Area 1554

**Area 1344

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

On Assignment — 19 Fish, Belton Lake, 28 April 2015

April 28th, 2015April 28th, 2015 by Bob Maindelle

On this unusually cold late April morning I was joined by an all-lady crew consisting of Bonnie Mobley, Sandy Blevins, and Elizabeth McLane.

Sandy Blevins took the prize for most and biggest today.

Bonnie Mobley holds a hybrid striped bass that took a large, 5″ gizzard shad fished around 22′ over a 35′ bottom.

Elizabeth McLane jumped out with an early 2-fish lead with faith that the right side of the boat was the “right” side to fish on.

These three ladies are friends from Sunday School at their church, First Baptist Church of Belton. They were all very pleasant to be with, were dressed adequately for the cold, damp weather, and were fast learners. I commented during the trip how I always enjoy having groups of ladies out because they tend to listen so much better than men when it comes to using circle hooks, and, as a result, put more fish in the boat. As evidence of this, over the course of this morning’s trip, we had exactly 21 “pull downs”. A “pull down” is where a fish takes a bait aggressively enough to pull the rod tip towards and/or into the water and moves off far enough to cause the bait clicker to make the audible noise it is designed to make. These ladies boated 19 of these 21 opportunities; that’s an unusually high 90%+.

A damp cold front is always tough to contend with, and today was no exception. I anticipated the cold front conditions, but the dampness was not in the forecast to the extent that we experienced it this morning. Shad were tough to find and net, and the fishing was a bit soft, as well. The wind velocity made getting on and staying on some of the open water areas I’ve been fishing a bit tough, but, we caught fish at 3 of the 4 areas at which we stopped and put baits down. I noticed that we would arrive at an area, get bait and chum going, catch a few fish, and just as soon as the fish fired up, they would cool back down again, allowing just 5-7 fish per stop. We never really got a good feeding frenzy going beneath the boat.

Although Elizabeth jumped out in front with an early 2-fish lead, Sandy’s rod got the most attention today, and she wound up catching the largest fish of the trip.

Elizabeth told a great story about a businessman she once knew who was also a successful Belton Lake fisherman. He named his boat “Assignment” and then trained his receptionist to tell those who called during business hours while he was away fishing that he was “on Assignment.”

I just doesn’t seem right to wear long underwear and gloves in Texas on April 28th!

TALLY = 19 FISH, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 8:15a

End Time: 12:40p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 56F

Water Surface Temp: 71F on lower lake; 72-73F in upper Leon River

Wind Speed & Direction: NNW14-16

Sky Conditions: Heavy grey skies with occasional light rain and constant light drizzle

Other: GT=40

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 835

**Area 1383

**Area 1482

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Persistence Paid Off – 54 Fish, Belton, 25 April 2015

April 26th, 2015 by Bob Maindelle

On Saturday, 25 April, I was joined by Lance Huhn of Killeen, and his sons, Robert Broadhead, Dylan Huhn, and Jason Huhn.

Dylan holds our best fish of the trip — a 3.75 pound striper that took a jumbo threadfin shad.

From left: Robert and Lance landed this double when the action got hot and heavy as the westerly wind increased.

Jason wasn’t quite sure about sticking his thumb in this fish’s mouth to pose for a photo — dad to the rescue!

Lance is a retired U.S. Army non-commissioned officer originally from east Texas, Robert is a senior at Shoemaker High School in Killeen, and Dylan and Jason are both students at Maxdale Elementary School.

We enjoyed solid fishing at both ends of our trip, with a bit of a dry spell in the middle.

Our first 90 minutes on the water produced well for us as we fished live shad down around 24-26 feet over a ~38 foot bottom. During this time the winds were calm to light from the west, but the light level was low, given the early hour. Once the sun climbed higher, the fishing got tougher and tougher as the surface of the lake went glassy calm.

We moved from spot to spot, and I observed that a great number of bass boats were also moving about at this time, too. It seemed that everyone was on fish early, then, no matter where you were fishing or what you were fishing for, things got tough tor everyone around the same time, sending everyone searching for more success.

Around 11:15, enough of a west wind developed and sustained to allow for occasional white caps to form. The fish responded within 20 minutes and went on a solid feed. We were at the right place at the right time when a large school of hungry hybrids felt the urge to feed. We took our tally from 19 fish up to 54 fish in about a 75 minute window

We finished up with a mixed-bag catch of 54 fish including (mainly) hybrid striped bass, with a sprinkling of white bass, blue catfish, crappie, and largemouth bass.

TALLY = 54 FISH, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:45a

End Time: 12:00p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 62F

Water Surface Temp: 69-70F

Wind Speed & Direction: SE9-16 during the early morning rain event, then going slack under bright conditions after the storm’s passage, with a S. wind picking up around 11:30a

Sky Conditions: Rainy skies, clearing to 40% clouds on a fair blue sky.

Other: GT=0

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1341 for the early, low light bite

**Area 1557 after the late-developing wind began

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Breaking in the New Kid — 31 Fish, 24 April 2015

April 26th, 2015 by Bob Maindelle

This past Friday morning, April 24th, I awoke early to a steady rain on a southeast wind. My crew for this day was a pretty hardy bunch without much flex in their schedule, so, with no thunder or lightning accompanying the rain, we pressed on with our plans and got out on Lake Belton for a morning of hybrid striped bass fishing, beginning around 7:45am.

Corey Oliver and his son, Cullen, with one of the hybrid we boated during a steady rain over Belton Lake this morning.

Joe Oliver coordinated this trip and included his father, affectionately called “Pa”, as well as his son, Corey, now working for Nike in Oregon, and Corey’s not-quite-5-year-old son, Cullen.

Joe has been on a wide enough variety of trips with me through the years to know I would have some misgivings about taking a child that young on a live-bait fishing trip, but, Cullen did far better than I expected he would, and I let both his dad and grandfather know that.

The aim today was to give Joe and Corey some overdue father-and-son time, and go get Cullen a bit of exposure to the outdoors, to being on a boat, and to doing a little fishing.

Our best action today came during the steady rain in the first 90 minutes of our trip, and then again just after skies cleared and before the winds went totally slack. At one point in time during the rainfall, the winds ramped up to 17-18 mph and our results definitely dropped off (likely due to the unnatural movement of our baits thanks to the boat bouncing heavily in the swells) from that time and until we found some more fish at a new location under clearing skies with a gentle westerly breeze (which would die after just 15-20 minutes).

When all was said and done, we boated exactly 31 fish, including a 50/50 mix of hybrid stripers and blue catfish, with 2 white bass thrown in for good measure.

For whatever reason, Cullen was just fascinated with the mouths of the fish we caught, requesting a look inside each one. Sure, he enjoyed reeling the fish in, aided by his father or grandfather, but, once that fish was in the boat, he asked, without fail, “What’s in his mouth?”.

Now, I am not at liberty to disclose all of the details at this point in time, but, suffice it to say that Cullen was totally amazed when one of the smaller blue catfish we reeled in had a year 2000 nickel in its mouth as I gently used a pair of curved-tip forceps to part its lips and give Cullen a peek.

After enduring a ~75 minute spell of bright, calm weather in the aftermath of the rain, we were invited over to share in some fishing success a friend of mind had gotten in to just as the south wind began to blow and strengthen. We headed over, boated 2 fish and, no doubt could have stayed for more, but, to their credit, dad and grandpa saw that Cullen had reached the end of his attention span and we agreed it was a good time to call it quits, fish or no fish, so as to keep this a positive first fishing experience for this young man.

TALLY = 31 FISH, all caught and released

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:45a

End Time: 12:00p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 62F

Water Surface Temp: 69-70F

Wind Speed & Direction: SE9-16 during the early morning rain event, then going slack under bright conditions after the storm’s passage, with a S. wind picking up around 11:30a

Sky Conditions: Rainy skies, clearing to 40% clouds on a fair blue sky.

Other: GT=0

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1554 during the rain

**Area 1555 immediately after the rain

**Area 1556 once the wind began from the S. after a period of calm

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Salado, TX

www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com