This morning, Tuesday, April 19, I fished with a party of four from Bagliore Concrete Company.  It is no wonder why this company has been so successful – – they have, and associate with, quality people.

From left: Mike Baker, Ken Wilkins, Greg Graham, and Donovan Graham with 5 of the many large, hard-pulling hybrid stripers that came over the gunwales this morning.  We did best early and late in the morning, with a slow period in the middle while the winds went flat.

Mike Baker’s big 6.25 pound, 23.75 inch hybrid was a thick, solid, hump-backed and wide-bellied fish – only the second this season attaining this weight.
Every time a crew from this company comes aboard, everyone is helpful, courteous, good-natured, and generous. As a guide, those things make you want to hustle that much more to put people on fish to make sure they really enjoyed themselves.   Today I was joined by Greg Graham and Mike Baker, both from the company’s sales staff, Ken Wilkins from Tex-Mix Concrete (a supplier to Bagliore Concrete), and Greg’s son, Donovan, who is currently an assistant project manager.

Things were a little iffy this morning as the lake had risen overnight thanks to recent flooding rains, and we experienced a very heavy fog, as well.

We actually began fishing around 8:15 AM once the fog had cleared and the lightest of ESE winds begin to ripple the surface.

At the first area we fished, we no sooner got four live baits down just shy of the bottom then all four rods were bowed over with nice, keeper hybrid stripers. The bite at this deepwater break line continued for 75 minutes, allowing us to catch 26 fish, over 75% of which were keeper hybrid stripers.

Between 9:45 and 11 AM, we struggled.  Nature was just dead. There were no birds singing, no gulls flying, no baitfish rippling the surface, and very little showing on sonar. We stuck with it, searching place after place until finally, around 11 AM, the lightest of west winds began. We now had great cloud  cover and moving water, so I moved us onto an underwater feature that was being impacted by the light wind. Sonar revealed three strong marks right on bottom in 42 feet of water. As the first of our four baits descended, I could see very aggressive fish come up toward the bait.  When the second, third, and fourth baits followed, the fish seemed to materialize from nowhere and nearly instantly flooded the screen with color. It was game-on for nearly 2 straight hours. During this time we took our fish count from 28 up to 86, again with at least 40% of these fish consisting of keeper hybrid stripers.

Mike landed the single largest fish of the trip, a 6.25 pound hybrid striper measuring 23.75 inches. This tied for the single largest fish caught this season.

When all was said and done we had landed 86 fish. It was now 1:15 PM, the sun was beginning to break through the clouds, and the surface had once again gone dead calm. The fishing ground to a halt, and we knew it was time to head to the dock.

 

TALLY: 86 Fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time:  8:15a

End Time:  1:15p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start:  64F

Water Surface Temp:   67.3

Wind Speed & Direction:   Light ESE winds from 8:15 – 9:45, then calm until 11:00, then light west ripple until 1:00p

Sky Conditions:  Grey overcast the entire trip

Water Level:  Rapidly rising thanks to recent heavy rainfall; ~594.70 feet with 594.00 being full pool.  Very little water is being released due to more severe flooding downstream (631 cu. ft./sec.)

Other: GT= 80

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area  1742/1540 from 8:15 to 9:45 just a few yards back from the breakline

**Area  vic 1012 from 11a to 1p on a light W. wind following a lengthy period of calm

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

This past Saturday afternoon, April 16th, I fished with members of the Killingsworth clan of Lampasas including (grandpa) Kenneth Killingsworth, (grandma) Frances Killingsworth, (son) Ken Killingsworth, (15-year-old granddaughter) Sarah Killingsworth, and (13-year-old granddaughter) LeeAnn Parker.  As I understand it, this whole thing was Grandma Frances’ idea.

From left: Kenneth, Frances, Ken, LeeAnn, and Sarah, each with a 13+ inch white bass taken during a solid bite as winds became more southerly following this morning’s easterly winds which dampened the fishing somewhat.  Look at those teenaged girls grinning!!

Leave it to Grandma Frances to catch the biggest fish of the trip — a nice 2.75 pound channel catfish that hit her slab in 37 feet of water.

 

The weather was looking questionable but, within 30 minutes of our 3:45p start time, a quick check of the weather radar showed only heavy clouds and occasional light sprinkles heading our way.

 

After a short prayer to start us off right, I went over both safety considerations and how to correctly use the slabs I had tied on to each of the spinning rods I’d prepared for my guests.  We made sure the reels’ handles were on the side that everyone preferred, and then we were off to hunt large schools of white bass in an attempt to get everyone catching fish.

 

I search one area, and then another with no result.  I searched a third area and found just a few fish holding tight to bottom.  I used Spot Lock to hold us in place over these fish as we jigged for them, but only 2 fish responded.  We caught 1 and missed the other.  This was not the fast action I was hoping to put a large party onto.

 

We moved to a fourth area and, as we motored slowly over a breadline from 50 feet up to 32 feet, the sonar screen began to come alive with fish showing on and near bottom.  Since everyone had worked the kinks out on their technique at the last area, all went very smoothly getting 5 baits effectively down to the bottom and working amidst the fish.

 

Sarah was the first one to connect, then her dad, Ken, hooked a fish, then LeeAnn was fast to another fish.  As the fish were hooked and reeled in, I watched on sonar as the hooked fishes’ schoolmates followed them toward the surface hoping to get a nip at the object in the hooked fishes’ mouths.  There were literally hundreds of fish in this area.  We caught fish after fish after fish, and whenever things slowed down, I simply moved us a few boat lengths left, right, forwards, or backwards to encounter even more fish that had not yet seen our lures.

 

We fished just 3 areas very thoroughly over the course of our 4 hours on the water, and by 7:30p, had amassed a catch of 108 fish including 1 freshwater drum, 1 channel catfish, 3 largemouth bass, and 103 white bass.

 

Between the fish catching, the story telling, the jerky eating, and the being with family, a cool, damp day turned into a very memorable event.

 

 

TALLY: 108 Fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:45p

End Time:  7:45p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 73F

Water Surface Temp:  68.3F

Wind Speed & Direction:  Winds were SE12-13 the entire trip

Sky Conditions:  Very heavy grey skies the entire trip with occasional drizzle.

Water Level: 622.41 and holding with 622.0 being full pool.  Water being released at 765 cubic feet per second.  Lake neither rose or fell the past 24 hours

Other: GT= 50

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1720/1741 – slow easing results at this first stop over fish

**Area 638/803/1156 – short hops and slow easing for a solid white bass bite

**Area 786/1055  – short hops and slow easing for a solid white bass bite

**Area 108/702/1048 – short hops and slow easing for a solid white bass bite

 

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

This past Saturday morning, April 16th, I fished with father and son Dennis and Ben Vacula on Belton Lake with the intention of bagging some hybrid striped bass.

From left: Dr. Ben Vacula of Belton and his dad, Dennis Vacula, of LaGrange with a pot-bellied Belton Lake hybrid striped bass.  The east wind and murky skies put the bite off a bit this morning, but the pair still managed to boat 65 fish.

 

Ben, an anesthesiologist at Baylor Scott & White, has fished a number of trips with me, but all of them were focused on his kids.  On this particular day it was “guys only”, so we set our sights on bigger game.

 

As much as I love to fish in cloudy, breezy conditions, winds from due E. can dampen the fishing a bit (hence the old saying “Winds from the east, fish bite least).  This morning we were greeted by a stiff E. wind blowing at 12-13mph and it did indeed impact the fishing.  By comparison, on my last 6 morning trips prior to this morning’s I’d been able to put clients on shallow, aggressive white bass under birds all in the same general area.  Fish counts ranged from the 20’s up into the 70’s.  Today, we spent just under an hour in this area and pulled only 5 fish.

 

By 8:45a, however, the murky skies had lightened and the winds slowed and began shifting to the ESE and the fishing began to kick in.  We vertical jigged in about 36’ after seeing some bottom-hugging, heavily schooled fish on sonar.  We quickly took our fish count from 5 up to 41 before I felt that the combination of wind, light level, and fish activity was sufficient to begin searching out hybrid.

 

I found 2 distinct areas holding both fish and ample bait, including a few legal (18” or larger) hybrid.  At the first area, the fish were initially seen suspended on sonar.  We managed 3 hybrid right away, but the fish then moved out despite my use of chum to attempt to hold them under us.  We stayed a while longer hoping to see this group of fish circulate back by, but only small pods of smaller fish did so.

 

We moved around checking 3 areas out and finding little.  The fourth area we checked was alive with fish and bait with heavily schooled, mainly sub-legal hybrid holding from 20 feet deep down to the bottom in 40 feet of water.  It was right around 11:30a and the time when the fishing has been winding down on all of this past week’s morning trips.  Since this bite appeared to just be staring, we stuck with it until the bite died.

 

We caught just shy of 20 fish from this area in about 40 minutes’ time and then called it a day.

 

TALLY: 142 Fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:30a

End Time:  12:30p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 64F

Water Surface Temp:  66.5F

Wind Speed & Direction:  Winds were E12 until around 8:45, then went ESE67

Sky Conditions:  Very heavy grey skies until the 8:45a wind shift, then lighter grey skies.

Water Level: 594.51 and falling with 594.0 being full pool.  Water being released at 765 cubic feet per second.  Lake fell 0.06 feet in the past 24 hours

Other: GT= 0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1734-1735 2 whites, 1 carp, 1 freshwater drum, 1 short hybrid

**Area 1187  one and two-year class whites and short hybrid

**Area 1738 hybrid and short hybrid

**Area 473 heavily schooled short hybrid

 

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

This past Friday morning, April 15th, I fished with a crew of 4 from Pride of Texas Landscaping including trip coordinator and long-time client Rob Ramey, Justin Pride, the company’s owner, Ricky Guest, one of the company’s clients, and Brian Badour, a former co-worker who now runs his own company.

From left: Rob Ramey and Justin Pride, both of Pride of Texas Irrigation and Landscaping, had a field day on white bass and hybrid stripers.

I had a bit of a “situation” develop when my trolling motor malfunctioned, but, thank God for the foresight to have a running spare and for an awesome wife willing to deliver that running spare to me!  We were delayed about 45 minutes, but, there was such a thick blanket of fog covering the lake that the fishing didn’t start until it had begun to thin, anyway.

 

We fished what has been a very predictable bite for primarily white bass up in shallow water for about an hour casting blade baits in 12-17 feet of water, putting a total of 76 fish in the boat as the fog cleared with a SE wind.

 

Once the laughing gull action died as the fish pulled back on their feeding, we headed to deeper, clearer water to search for hybrid stripers using sonar.

 

We enjoyed a full 2.5 hours of solid hybrid striper fishing spread over two distinct areas.  At the first area, I found hybrid suspended from 25 to 40 feet over a 55 foot bottom, and at the second area we found hybrid in the lower fourth of the water column in 48-49 feet of water near a breakline.

 

Neither Justin nor Brian had any prior experience in fishing for hybrid striper and both quickly gained an appreciation for the hybrid vigor these fish demonstrate.  This was a great crew to fish with — and very good-natured in joking with each other.

 

Despite the rough start, we ended the trip with exactly 142 fish boated as the action tapered off quickly right around 12:30 following our late start.

 

TALLY: 142 Fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 8:15a

End Time:  12:30p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 62F

Water Surface Temp:  66.1F

Wind Speed & Direction:  Winds were calm under foggy conditions until 8:15a.  A SE10 wind began and blew out the fog through around 9:30a.  Winds then scaled back to SE6-7 and the skies grew brighter through about 70% cloud cover.  Conditions remained this way for the remainder of the trip.

Sky Conditions:  See above

Water Level: 594.57 and falling with 594.0 being full pool.  Water being released at 765 cubic feet per second.  Lake fell 0.05 feet in the past 24 hours

Other: GT= 60

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 749-1734 whites and short hybrid on blade baits up shallow

**Area 1738 hybrid on shad suspended at 25-40′ over a 55′ bottom

**Area 1739 hybrid on shad at lower fourth of water column in 48′

 

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

This past Thursday evening, April 14th,  I met and fished with Mr. Gordon Caesar who traveled to Texas from Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin, to visit family near both Houston and near Georgetown.

Gordon and I first came to know one another when he read an article of mine published in In-Fisherman magazine and then bought a few lures from me which I produce and which were described in that article.

 

Gordon’s desire was to understand as many white bass-specific techniques as he could during our 4 hours on the water because he lives near and fishes on Lake Winnebago which has a tremendous white bass population.

 

I covered 4 basic techniques including vertical jigging with a slab, a tactic I refer to as “easing” with a slab, fishing horizontally with a blade bait, and using live bait on tightlines (more of a hybrid tactic, but appropriate for large white bass if using smaller live baits).

 

I also covered the variables I consider when deciding where to fish (mainly wind direction), and I covered the fundamentals of sonar use by providing the essential settings for colored sonar, charts, and StructureScan.  Gordon kept a small spiral-bound notebook and took copious notes the entire time.

 

We found white bass in 31-38 feet deep at four different areas and at the last two, had Gordon identify when and where the fish were located as they appeared on sonar..

 

For a grand finale, I put Gordon on top of some hybrid striper using bait I’d held over from the morning’s hybrid-focused trip.  As the sun began to set, and for about 25 minutes thereafter (thanks to clear skies) the hybrid went on a low-light feeding binge, allowing Gordon to sprinkle a little quality atop his quantity of white bass we’d amassed.

 

We closed out our trip and met Gordon’s wife, Deb, back at the dock following her jaunt to Waco.  We finished up with 49 fish boated (and approximately 49 pages of notes hand-written).

 

TALLY: 49 fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:15a

End Time:  11:45a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 68F

Water Surface Temp:  66.1F

Wind Speed & Direction:  Winds were ESE at 3-4 until 9:15.  Then skies cleared and the winds picked up to 11-13mph

Sky Conditions:  90-100% grey skies to the point of light rain until 9:15, then clearing to 40% clouds.

Water Level: 594.62 and falling with 594.0 being full pool.  Water being released at 765 cubic feet per second.  Lake fell 0.05 feet in the past 24 hours

Other: GT= 45

Wx SNAPSHOT (a graphical look at the forecast that faced us today):

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1608 jigging and easing with slabs for white bass

**Area 472 jigging and easing with slabs for white bass

**Area 472 jigging and easing with slabs for white bass

**Area 1740/1285 jigging and easing with slabs for white bass

**Area 1012 live shad for hybrid at last light

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

This past Thursday morning, 14 April, I fished with a four-man party from Bagliore Concrete out of Jarrell, Texas.  Aboard were Tony Bagliore, Scott Kearsing, Josh Torres, and Josh Grooms.

Tony Bagliore took the largest hybrid landed aboard my boat thus far this 2016 season.  This fish weighed in at 6.25 pounds and beat out 3 other fish which each weighed 5.25 pounds for top honors.

Thanks to the consistency and predictability of the bite, we invested our first hour fishing for white bass in shallow water ranging from 12 to 15 feet deep. Actively feeding laughing gulls clearly pointed the way to actively feeding fish pushing shad to the surface. We fished this area until 8:50 AM, boating a total of 26 fish consisting of white bass in the one, two, and three year class, with a single large mouth bass and a couple of short hybrid thrown in. As the fish wrapped up their feed, the birds slacked off and began to rest on the surface. We packed up and headed for deep water in search of hybrid stripers.

We fished three deep water areas beginning around 9:15a through 11:30a.  Fish were small and sparse at our first stop.  Our second stop, in roughly 42 feet of water, produced 6 keeper hybrid before numerous small fish invaded the area.

We moved to our third and final area, also in 42 feet of water, with deeper water nearby.  Just up onto the flat from the breakline, we encountered a strong showing of what appeared to be hybrid striper on sonar. Our suspicions were confirmed within seconds of getting live baits down amongst these fish. We enjoyed a solid hour of catching legal & sub-legal hybrid striper on live threadfin shad.

During this feeding spree, Tony Bagliore landed the largest hybrid of the season thus far — a 6.25 pounder. Previously, three 5.25 pound fish had tied for top honors.

We ended our day right at 11:30 so the crew could get back to work selling and pouring concrete. Our final count stood at 68 fish.

 

TALLY: 68 Fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:45a

End Time:  11:30

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 54F

Water Surface Temp:  66.1F

Wind Speed & Direction:  Winds were WNW8-9 most of the trip.

Sky Conditions:  100% grey skies for the entire trip.

Water Level: 594.57 and falling with 594.0 being full pool.  Water being released at 765 cubic feet per second.  Lake fell 0.06 feet in the past 24 hours

Other: GT= 155

 

Wx Snapshot:

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area  1735-1736 – 1, 2, and 3 year class white bass under birds in shallow water
**Area  vic 1288 – slow fishing for small hybrid and a few white bass

**Area vic  1079 – good results on keeper hybrid, then small fish moved in

**Area 1737 – excellent results on keeper hybrid

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

This past Tuesday afternoon, 12 April, I met up with retired U.S. Navy captain Ray Johnson of Harker Heights.  Ray fishes with me about once each quarter.  Our last trip was in pursuit of quality white bass using artificial lures on Stillhouse.  This day, for variety’s sake, we headed out after a mixed bag of fish, including hybrid stripers, on Belton.

Retired U.S. Navy Captain Ray Johnson of Harker Heights with one of several sizeable hybrid striped bass we caught under grey skies and a NE wind today.

Due to NE winds and heavy cloud cover today, there was very little temperature variation from morning to evening.  Because the wind had been from the NE, I focus on areas directly impacted by this wind.  Because we chose to shoot for larger fish, this meant using bait.  There can be some periods of waiting while using bait as schools of fish come and go through an areas, so, it allows more time for conversation than when working artificials for smaller fish.

Since Ray had spent time at sea, I asked him about the single most remarkable sight he’d ever witnessed.  He didn’t have to think very long before telling me the tale of encountering a massive, rogue wave in the Mediterranean that literally washed across the flight deck of the USS John F. Kennedy while he was on it.  He told how they had some advanced warning of it because it showed up both on radar, and the sonar technicians could hear the sound it gave off quite some distance away … and how it was both terrifying and impressive nonetheless.  Good story!

We fished 4 areas, finding small fish to jig for at the first, scant fishing producing 2 keeper hybrid at the second area, suspended white bass and short hybrid at the third area, and the quality fishing for hybrid stripers that we were gunning for on Belton at the final area we fished in the last 50 minutes of light.

 

TALLY: 51 Fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:45p

End Time:  7:45p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 68F

Water Surface Temp:  66.5F

Wind Speed & Direction:  Winds were ESE at 11-12  with occasional drizzle right up until the last hour when winds slowly tapered down to ESE6.

Sky Conditions:  100% grey skies to the point of light rain for the entire trip.

Water Level: 594.69 and falling with 594.0 being full pool.  Water being released at 765 cubic feet per second.  Lake fell 0.05 feet in the past 24 hours

Other: GT= 0

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1606 – small fish, mainly white bass, on slabs only in 41′
**Area vic 1318/346 two  keeper hybrid on live bait followed by a handful of smaller fish

**Area vic 972/1075 lots of suspended fish; got a few whites and short hybrid on live baits fished at 22-25′ over a 37′ bottom.

**Area 1288 – consistent fishing for the last 50 minutes of light for keeper and just-short hybrid along with a few white bass using live bait.  Fishing started on bottom in 37′, then moved steadily upwards in the water column as the light failed.

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

This past Tuesday morning, April 12th, I welcomed aboard returning guest Carroll Hall and his wife, Nancy.  The Hall’s traveled in from southwest of Austin to fish with me this morning.

From left: Nancy and Carroll Hall paused just long enough in the middle of a hybrid striper feeding spree to snap this photo.  They then got right back on the shad-baited rods and kept bringing fish of this same caliber in the boat.

Although Carroll is quite an accomplished angler, especially in the realm of flyfishing (including Federation of Fly Fishers certification as a Master Certified Casting Instructor), it had been quite some time since Nancy had handled a rod, and she was not all that familiar with spinning gear.  So, I suggested we put the pursuit of hybrid off until later in our trip and pursue more numerous, but smaller, white bass casting blade baits horizontally up in shallow water.

 

This paid off handsomely.  With an entourage of about 50 laughing gulls to point the way to active fish, we were able to move along with the main body of white bass as they went on a feeding spree with grey skies overhead and choppy water all around.  I positioned the boat using the #Minnkota Ulterra upwind allowing us to cast downwind into the fish.  This served to lengthen our casts and keep the wind and drizzle to our backs.  The Halls managed 24 fish in right at an hour’s time using both the blade baits cast horizontally and slabs fished vertically.

 

As the feed began to wind down, we made our way into clearer, deeper water to seek out hybrid striped bass.

 

I looked for fish in areas impacted by the NNE wind which was blowing right at 12 mph.  In doing so, I found two distinct populations of fish holding about 150 yards apart atop the same N-S oriented breakline in about 40 feet of water.  The first area gave up numerous, but small, fish.  The second area was revealed to us by a small flock of 8-10 actively working laughing gulls and gave up the best quality fish we encountered all morning, including 12 legal hybrid striped bass.  All of these were taken on live shad.

 

As has been the case quite regularly this season, not long after we began catching good quality fish, smaller fish, attached by all the ruckus, moved in and began killing and stealing bait.  Our strike to land ratio dropped off substantially.  We actually wrapped up the trip by vertical jigging with slabs for the short hybrids and 1 and  2 year old white bass that were carpeting the bottom.  We finished up with exactly 68 fish for the effort we put in.

 

TALLY: 68 Fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:45a

End Time:  11:45a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 64F

Water Surface Temp:  66.5F

Wind Speed & Direction:  Winds were ESE at 11-12 the entire trip with occasional drizzle.

Sky Conditions:  100% grey skies to the point of light rain for the entire trip.

Water Level: 594.69 and falling with 594.0 being full pool.  Water being released at 765 cubic feet per second.  Lake fell 0.05 feet in the past 24 hours

Other: GT= 45

Wx SNAPSHOT (a graphical look at the forecast that faced us today):

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1735/1736 casting to shallow whites with blades & easing with slabs

**Area vic 472 smaller fish on live bait

**Area vic 1608 legal hybrid stripers first evidenced by feeding birds, giving way to smaller and smaller fish as time went by.  Started with live bait and ended by easing with slabs.

 

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

This past Monday, April 11th, I met up with Bob Schwartz of Temple, his son, Will Schwartz of Austin, and local businessman, Jeff Jones (a friend of Bob’s), for a morning of fishing on Lake Belton.  This was Bob’s third trip with me, Will’s second, and Jeff’s first.

From left: Bob is a retired judge, Jeff runs an environmental services company in Temple and has a son who is a junior in high school, and Will works in logistics and has 3 young children. The trio put together a bag of 73 fish this morning.

 

As we got going, I led us in prayer to settle my mind a bit.  I hit some road debris on FM439 as I was headed out to get bait and wound up having to change my flat passenger-side front tire in the dark and rain on the shoulder of the road.  This threw my timing off for the morning and I felt a bit frazzled before 7am ever rolled around.

 

I then laid out all of the options to these fellows, including the option of some fast action for smaller fish on light spinning tackle up shallow, and/or the option of fishing bait for fewer but larger fish out deeper.

 

It was clear that Bob and Jeff wanted to learn about fishing as much as they desired to catch fish, so, we agreed that providing exposure to multiple tactics would be helpful and desirable.

 

Because of the very heavy, dark cloud cover (to the point of light rain), the low-light fishery that usually develops in advance of sunrise was pushed back a bit this morning.  In the interest of teaching, I explained about the process of finding and gathering bait, and we spent some time patrolling for spawning shad.

 

Afterwards, we set out for shallow water and I kept my eyes peeled for birds feeding on baitfish forced to the surface by the gamefish we desired to catch.  It didn’t take long to find action using my optics — about 30 laughing gulls were tearing it up in 13-19 feet of water on a flat.  We got to them, closed the distance with the trolling motor, and began fan casting blade baits for consistent hookups over a 75 minute span.

 

As it became clear that this shallow-water bite was about to wrap up (as evidenced by greatly reduced bird activity and a falling catch rate), we headed out to deeper water.

 

We fished two areas with live shad, pickup up keeper hybrid at the first area before the commotion involved in catching them drew smaller fish in forcing us to leave.  The second area produced only smallish fish.

 

In talking with other regular Belton anglers, this seems to be the trend this season.  I’m running at about a 15% proportion of keeper hybrid stripers (those 18 inches or greater) to the rest of the catch (short hybrid, white bass of all sizes, drum, blue catfish, largemouth and smallmouth.

 

We finished up this morning’s trip with exactly 73 fish boated after the first bite began around 8:15, thanks to that dark cloud cover moving the timing of the morning bite back a bit.

 

TALLY: 73 Fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:15a

End Time:  11:45a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 68F

Water Surface Temp:  66.1F

Wind Speed & Direction:  Winds were ESE at 3-4 until 9:15.  Then skies cleared and the winds picked up to 11-13mph

Sky Conditions:  90-100% grey skies to the point of light rain until 9:15, then clearing to 40% clouds.

Water Level: 594.74 and falling with 594.0 being full pool.  Water being released at 765 cubic feet per second.  Lake fell 0.05 feet in the past 24 hours

Other: GT= 50

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1735 casting to shallow whites with blades

**Area vic 098 keeper hybrid followed by small fish

**Area vic 953 lots of smaller fish, followed by bluecat that came into the chum

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

This evening, Saturday, 9 April, I fished with Lance Lee and his 7-year-old daughter, Logen.  The pair drove in all the way from Hobbs, New Mexico, after an early morning wakeup and a stop in Waco to pick up a really cool-looking mobile chicken coop, to come out fishing with me on Stillhouse Hollow in pursuit of white bass.

Lance and Logen Lee of Hobbs, New Mexico, caught 100 fish this evening on a daddy-daughter fishing trip that went just right.

Lance and Logen had fished with me once before last summer after the thermocline set up, so, today’s vertical jigging trip was very different from that hot weather trip involving a lot of downrigging and panfishing up shallow using slip floats.

 

We got going right at 3:45p, and checked three areas before finding fish.  We found heavily congregated white bass literally carpeting the bottom over a span of 20 yards in about 34 feet of water.  I dropped the #Ulterra and put Spot Lock on a mission to keep up over these fish in a ~16mph wind.  We boated 24 fish here before the bite died down forcing us to look elsewhere.

 

Our next bit of success came at an irregularity in the bottom adjacent to the river channel, also in 34 feet of water.  These fish were holding on a breakline in a tight cluster.  We again Spot Locked over top of these fish and worked our white 3/4 oz. slabs vertically.   This area gave up 18 fish before going quiet.

 

Our next stop came in ~50 feet of water.  We jigged for just 6 fish here. Despite seeing interested fish from bottom upwards to as much as 4 feet off the bottom, they just got very reluctant.  It was now around 6pm and, given the decreasing light level and cloud cover, I decided to move us shallower to take advantage of the remaining light.

 

We checked several areas, finally finding fish in 25 feet of water.  These fish were tightly packed together and were holding in multiple, distinct clusters over a 60-yard diameter area.  I could tell this would be a good stop, as the fish began rising up off the bottom in curiosity about the noise produced by the outboard and trolling motor.  Indeed, the sheer number of fish here combined with the evening low-light period was a great combination.  We arrived at this area with 48 fish boated, and wrapped up our trip here a tad early with exactly 100 fish boated.

 

Logen had reached her limit and had her heart set on dinner right about 7:10pm, so, we called it a good day at that point and headed for home.

 

 

TALLY = 100 FISH, all caught and released

 

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TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:45p

End Time:  7:10p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 68F

Water Surface Temp:  65.6F

Wind Speed & Direction:  Winds were ESE13-15 the entire trip.

Sky Conditions:  90-100% grey skies the entire trip.

Water Level: 622.45 and falling with 622.0 being full pool.  Water being released at 399 cubic feet per second.  Lake fell 0.01 feet in the past 24 hours

Other: GT= 0

Wx SNAPSHOT (a graphical look at the forecast that faced us today):

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1720/088 — mid-depth vertical jigging for 24 fish
**Area 640/803 — mid-depth vertical jigging for 18 fish

**Area 873/1095 — deep vertical jigging for 6 fish

**Area

 

Bob Maindelle

Owner, Holding the Line Guide Service

254.368.7411 (call or text)

Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle