This past Friday evening I fished a multi-species trip on Lake Belton with Dave Covington of Belton, and his five-year-old son, Levi.

At 6:00pm, Dave, Levi, and I encountered this massive school of white bass numbering, literally, in the thousands.  The school was 23 feet thick and hung around our boat, drawn by the commotion created by their schoolmates being caught, for 25-30 minutes.  We caught a fish on most every drop of our slabs, quickly taking 40 fish during this feeding spree.

Dave Covington with his son, 5-year-old Levi, holding a 13 inch class white bass — one of the 80 we landed this evening using both downrigging and vertical jigging techniques.

This fishing trip was one of several “outdoorsy” activities the family planned to participate in as they camped out for the weekend at Cedar Ridge Park on Belton Lake. We began our trip at 3:30 and fished right up until dark at 7 PM. Given Levi Levi’s age, I came prepared to fish in a number of different ways so as to keep his interest up.

Of the various fishing options I described to Dave, he thought starting off by downrigging would be a good move.  I took us to a relatively timber-free area where I thought we could contact fish using the Cannon downriggers, and soon after arriving and looking things over with sonar, we put a single downrigger ball in the water set to 30 feet with a tandem rigged pair of Pet Spoons on the business end. Our first line was in the water less than 30 seconds and we had our first of many downrigger-caught fish on the line. We alternated between a two-arm and three-armed rig and routinely caught both singles and doubles ranging from one-year- old fish to three-year-old fish.

In a number of instances the fish so aggressively tracked after the downrigger ball, that I knew they would respond to a vertical tactic, so, several times we stopped downrigging, put the boat into a hover using the Ulterra trolling motor (the newest version just released with much improved Spot Lock capability), and let our slabs down into the melee. It was not uncommon to catch 10 or 15 fish at a clip before the fish lost interest. When they did, we simply went back to downrigging and repeated the whole process.

We took a short break to add some variety to the trip for Levi’s sake by going up shallow and fishing for sunfish, picking up 15 bluegill, green sunfish, longear sunfish, and redear sunfish (and keeping each one in the livewell, although we did stop just short of naming them individually!).

It was at this transition from sunfishing back to angling for white bass that young Levi burst forth into song, charming us with his rendition of that Willie ‘n’ Waylon classic “Mommas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys”.  Enough said.

Right around 6 PM we encountered a massive school of white bass numbering in the thousands. Although Levi’s interest was starting to fade at this point, David and I managed to keep him engaged as we quickly added 40 more fish to our count before the school drifted off. We followed that up with a final round of downrigging and took our fish count up to a grand total of 80 fish boated by the time the evening was through and night had come.

TALLY = 80 fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:30p

End Time:  7:00p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 68F

Water Surface Temp:  75.5F

Wind Speed & Direction:  NNE7-8

Sky Conditions: 100% grey cloud cover

Water Level: ~0.22 feet high and slowly rising thanks to light, area-wide rainfall

GT = 50

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 211-1675-1619 – rig to jig

**Area 1753 – sunfish

**Area vic 817 – smoking

**Area vic 1666 – low light downrigging at 20′ breakline

 

 

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

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-LGrD-sm7Bo6tDPIv0z4jg

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/holdingtheline/

This past Friday morning, I finished with Kevin Yuille and Bobby Gordon, both warrant officers serving in Army aviation.

From left:  Kevin Yuille and Bobby Gordon stayed hard after it for four full hours and surpassed the 100 fish mark by 10:45am with a 7:15am start.  The combination of warm water and the mild cold front that passed yesterday had the fish in high gear all morning.

The conditions today were near perfect. We had a balmy northeast breeze following the passage of yesterday’s mild cold front, leaving in its wake some thick gray cloud cover. The combination of cloud cover, light wind, and still warm water all worked together to have the white bass in a frenzy this morning.

The frenzy began up shallow at first light with occasional wolf packs of fish making their whereabouts obvious by breaking the surface briefly. This action then slowly moved deeper in the water column and further away from shore as the morning progressed, but the strong bite persisted for a full 3 1/2 hours beyond the obscured sunrise.

While the fish were visible early on, we sight cast using soft plastics and blade baits, and then as the action moved deeper, I searched out consolidated schools of fish with sonar, hovered on top of them with my new #Ulterra trolling motor (love it!!), and we used two vertical tactics – – slabbing and easing – – to continue to put fish in the boat. We wrapped up the morning with exactly 112 fish boated for our efforts.

One of the reasons Kevin and Bobby did so well today was because they were both eager to learn and willing to be coached. When I saw something in their technique that was going to cost them fish, I would point it out, and they would earnestly attempt to correct whatever deficiency I picked up on.

TALLY = 112 fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:15a

End Time:  11:15a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 62F

Water Surface Temp:  75.5F

Wind Speed & Direction:  NNE7-8

Sky Conditions: 100% grey cloud cover

Water Level: ~0.15 feet high and slowly rising thanks to light, area-wide rainfall

GT = 23

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1625-1665-1822-788-1668-164-171 vertical tactics for white bass following an early, low light sub-surface bite in shallow water.

 

 

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

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-LGrD-sm7Bo6tDPIv0z4jg

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/holdingtheline/

This past Thursday evening I fished with Dennis Moses, his wife Nakeya, and their eight-year-old son Ayden. Dennis, a US Army military policeman, was home on leave from his current assignment in Turkey and had a very limited window of time in which to get his family out fishing.  So, despite the wet and cooling conditions we faced this afternoon, Moses family was “all in” to pursue fish on Lake Belton.

True troopers!!  From left: Nakeya, Ayden, and Dennis Moses donned ponchos and braved the drizzle and cooling temperatures to put together a catch of 56 fish during the short time Dennis had home on leave from his assignment in Turkey.

This past Thursday evening I fished with Dennis Moses, his wife Nakeya, and their eight-year-old son Ayden. Dennis, a US Army military policeman, was home on leave from his current assignment in Turkey and had a very limited window of time in which to get his family out fishing.  So, despite the wet and cooling conditions we faced this afternoon, Moses family was “all in” to pursue fish on Lake Belton.

It seems that if ponchos are not required, this family just won’t go fishing!  I had the privilege of taking the Moses family out in the spring just before Dennis’ deployment began and we set out in a cool drizzle that day with everyone wearing ponchos, as well.

I ran a multi-species trip for this family and we targeted primarily white bass. The aggressive attitude of the fish displayed this morning as this mild, wet, cool front rolled in definitely dialed back this afternoon as the winds calmed to near nothing.

On a number of occasions we located heavily congregated fish and got them to follow our slabs routinely, but only infrequently would they strike at them.  So, after seeing quite a number of fish suspended between 15 and 20 feet beneath the surface over various depths of water and in various locations, I decided to go with a downrigging approach instead.

The downriggers definitely put more fish in the boat than any other tactic this afternoon, occasionally giving up doubles and regularly producing singles.

For just a short spell between 5:40 and 6 PM, after catching a double on each of the downriggers and seeing numerous fish, both on bottom and suspended, I decided to stop and give vertical jigging another try. We put three catfish in the boat in under two minutes and so I quickly changed us over to fishing with slip floats with fresh, dead shad as a cut bait.

We landed four more catfish in short order before the winds went calm and both the catfish and the white bass died off pretty suddenly. We spent our last hour downrigging and wound up with a total of 56 fish landed on the evening.

Ayden came up with the best idea of the whole cool, rainy trip, which was to go grab Chinese at the Oriental Kitchen in Killeen on their way back home!!

TALLY = 56 fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:00p

End Time:  7:00p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 68F

Water Surface Temp:  75.6F

Wind Speed & Direction:  NNW6, tapering off to calm

Sky Conditions: 100% grey cloud cover

Water Level: ~0.01 feet high with only evaporative losses

GT = 0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1675 downrigging for fish holding on a 30′ breakline and for suspended fish out away from it

**Areas 1824, 1680 –  vertical tactics for white bass

**Areas 328-788 – continued downrigging

**Area 788 – bluecat on bait for <30 minutes

**Area 1668-1877 – shallow downrigging for low-light end of evening 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

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-LGrD-sm7Bo6tDPIv0z4jg

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/holdingtheline/

This past Thursday morning I fished a multi-species trip on Lake Belton with DK and his four-year-old daughter.

DK hoists one of the “keeper”-sized (18+ inch) hybrid striped bass he landed on slabs this morning as his daughter gets about as close to the fish as she dared.  This fish went right at 4 pounds.

I was very excited to watch the weather develop and see a very slow moving, mild cold front creep into our area mainly bringing clouds and light winds, but very little temperature drop. For reasons known only to them, white bass and hybrid striper really seem to crank up under these conditions.

DK and I visited by phone the night before the trip and then again before he was due to leave the Austin area to make sure we had a sufficient weather window without the threat of lightning to get out and enjoy the good fishing that lie ahead.

Long story short, we caught fish from start to finish for a solid four hours. We devoted our first three hours to chasing white bass, and the last hour catching sunfish up in the still-warm shallow water so that his daughter could catch a number of fish “all by herself”.

The white bass started the morning up in shallow water under 15 feet, with a few individuals briefly dimpling the surface as they chased shad towards the surface. After the (obscured) sunrise, the fish moved out deeper – – to between 20 and 26 feet. The formula that worked for us this morning was to find active schools of fish using the downrigger, and then to work over those active schools using vertical tactics until the fish lost interest, and then pick up again with the downriggers and repeat that process over and over again.

In this way, we boated 48 white bass, two “keeper” hybrid striped bass, and one largemouth, for a total of 52 fish by 10 AM. We then went up shallow and landed an additional 38 sunfish, including green sunfish, bluegill sunfish, and longear sunfish, thus putting the grand total for our trip at 90 fish boated  in right at four hours.

A nice little fringe benefit of being willing to fish in the rain was the very scant additional boat traffic – – we saw only two bass boats all morning, both probing the shallows and therefore had the white bass all to ourselves.

TALLY = 90 fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:15a

End Time:  11:15a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 64F

Water Surface Temp:  75.6F

Wind Speed & Direction:  NNW6-8

Sky Conditions: 100% grey cloud cover

Water Level: ~0.01 feet high with only evaporative losses

GT = 0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 527 – soft plastics for low-light, pre-sunrise fish up shallow

**Areas 1821-1822-172-171-1823 –  vertical tactics for white bass in 20-26 feet of water on slabs

**Areas 1793 – sunfish under slipfloats in shallow cover

 

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

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-LGrD-sm7Bo6tDPIv0z4jg

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/holdingtheline/

This past Saturday evening I fished a multi species trip on Lake Belton. Joining me were Jack Kovach, Bob James, and Brittany Santoro. The three friends fish together regularly on Lake Belton but freely admitted that they did a lot more fishing than catching and wanted to come out with me not so much to catch fish, but to learn some better approaches at finding fish to catch.

From left: Bob James, Brittany Santoro, and Jack Kovach with Brittany’s new lake record white bass.  This fish measured 16.75″, thus eclipsing Garvon Golden’s 16.375″ fish caught the previous Tuesday.  Both fish exceeded the length of Lake Belton’s previous catch & release category white bass which stood at 15.75 inches since 2010.

Given the unseasonably warm air and water temperature, and the fact that we had a nearly cloudless sky, we spent the majority of our time probing deeper water haunts with a vertical approach using slabs to attempt schooled white bass congregated near bottom.

We never really “slayed ‘em” at any one area, but rather put together a decent catch by moving frequently and staying focused on our techniques. I reserved some time between vertical jigging and throwing bladebaits for fish up shallow just before dark to introduce the trio to the technique of downrigging.

As luck would have it, on our very first pass at fish holding tight to bottom in about 22 feet of water, Brittany came up with a triple on her three-armed umbrella rag. We went on to catch additional singles and doubles in this same area until everyone had had several turns using this tactic.

As the sun set, and right up until the fish quit biting around 7:20, we threw bladebaits in under 13 feet of water for white bass patrolling the shallows hunting shad in wolf packs. As I was assisting Jack with a white bass he had hooked on his bladebait, Bob James and I turned our attention to Brittany who was needing some assistance on the starboard side. After I left her to go assist Jack, she hooked what would be the second lake record white bass taken on my boat in less than a week’s time.

We immediately put Brittany’s jumbo white on the measuring board and I saw that it eclipsed 16.375 inches, stretching a full 16.75 inches. Photography was difficult because of the failing light, but we all pitched in with cell phone flashlights and got decent, clear photos of Brittany with her fish, as well as photos of the fish on the measuring board.

What an awesome way to end the trip. Our total for the night stood at 68 fish, including hybrid striped bass, white bass, largemouth bass, and a single crappie. All fish were taken on artificial bait.

TALLY = 55 fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:00p

End Time:  7:20p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 81F

Water Surface Temp:  76.7F

Wind Speed & Direction:  SSE8

Sky Conditions: Fair skies with 20% white cloud cover

Water Level: ~0.01 feet high with only evaporative losses

GT = 45

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Areas vic 1819, 1667-993 — all deep vertical jigging for white bass with slabs

**Areas 328-1681 — downrigging

**Areas 1664-1665 — low light shallow bite on bladebaits

 

 

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

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-LGrD-sm7Bo6tDPIv0z4jg

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/holdingtheline/

This past Tuesday morning, November 1st, I fished with Tony Bagliore, and a couple from his church, Sonny and Vita Sharpe. The Bagliores and Sharps have known one another for over 17 years.

From left: Vita Sharpe, Sonny Sharpe, and Tony Bagliore, each with one of the larger 13 to 14+ inch class white bass we landed using primarily vertical tactics in 22-30 feet of water under grey, breezy conditions.

Tony has good reason to smile!  This was the 3rd white bass exceeding 16 inches caught on my boat in the past 8 days.  Up until October 25th last week, the lake record white bass length for the catch and release category stood at under 16 inches.  Nice catch, Tony!
Given today’s very “fishy” weather, consisting of gray cloud cover and a southeasterly breeze, I suspected the fishing would be easy and productive. I came prepared to conduct a multi-species trip focused primarily on white bass caught on artificial lures.

As it turned out, Sonny was just along for the ride, and Tony and Vita did all of the fishing. As soon as the eastern sky began to lighten up a bit, I arrived at an area I intended to check out, noted ample bait beginning around the 25 foot mark and progressing up shower, and also noted heavily grouped but also widely dispersed schools of white bass near the bait.

Soon after seeing this on sonar, I noticed the first shallow top water action indicating white bass had pushed ahad well up into shallow water.  Although the cooling water has kept the whites from feeding on top in a sustained way, there were still occasional eruptions on the surface sufficient to allow us to stay on top of the fish. We began casting soft plastics and blade baits into the shallow water bite, but, it didn’t last long.  This bite died as the sun rose (albeit obscured by the cloud cover).

As the skies began to brighten through the gray cloud cover, the bite moved further away from shore. Most of our fishing through 10:45 took Place in 22 to 30 feet of water.  As 10:45 rolled around, we had put a total of 81 fish in the boat, primarily using a vertical “easing” tactic with 3/8 ounce slabs.

In our last hour, and in order to introduce some variety, I offered that we could shoot for catching some blue catfish on slip floats using cut shad as bait.

At our second stop, and after the chum I was using had a chance to work, we began to catch blue cat, albeit small ones, with consistency. During our final 45 minutes on the water, we boated a grand total of 15 blue catfish and missed opportunities at about as many.

We called it a good day at around noon with a grand total of 96 fish boated. Of note was Tony’s largest white bass which measured 16.50 inches. This is the third white bass over 16 inches my clients have boated in the last eight days. This is remarkable given that for the last six years, the catch and release lake record stood below 16 inches.

TALLY = 96 fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:15a

End Time:  12:10p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 68F

Water Surface Temp:  76.7F

Wind Speed & Direction:  SSE8

Sky Conditions: 100% grey cloud cover

Water Level: ~0.01 feet high with only evaporative losses

GT = 110

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 183 – bladebaits and soft plastics for low-light, pre-sunrise fish up shallow

**Areas 172 – 164 – 818 – 1024  – 691 –  vertical tactics for white bass in 22-30 feet of water on slabs

**Areas 1820 – small blue cat on cutbait

 

 

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

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-LGrD-sm7Bo6tDPIv0z4jg

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/holdingtheline/

This past Friday afternoon I fished with Father Brad St. Romain on Belton Lake. I ran a multi-species trip, mainly targeting white bass.

Among the 55 fish landed this evening, two of our white bass eclipsed the 14″ mark.  Those are respectable white bass on a relatively infertile lake like Belton.  One of those large whites came on a slab, and the one pictured here came on a bladebait.

This past Friday afternoon I fished with Father Brad St. Romain on Belton Lake. I ran a multi-species trip, mainly targeting white bass.

Father Brad has served as the rector of Saint Francis Episcopal church in Temple since 2011.  The two of us have been trying to find a mutually agreeable fishing day since June of this year.  When excessive wave height forced the cancellation of an offshore fishing trip I was to attend with a friend, I contacted Brad to see if we might make this a win – win.

Fortunately, Brad had a good bit of prior fishing experience, primarily in shallow salt water. He was definitely able to handle a spinning rod, and that would help him put fish in the boat this afternoon.

For the first three hours of our four-plus hour trip, we searched for heavily concentrated white bass in water ranging from 25 to 40 feet deep, set up in a hover over top of these fish using my new and improved Minn Kota Ulterra trolling motor, and vertically jigged using 3/8 oz. silver slabs complete with stinger hooks.

I’ll take a quick departure here and share that the positioning on this new #MinnKota #Ulterra unit is many times better than the positioning capability on the previous version. Not only does this unit more quickly acquire its position after the Spot Lock button is pressed, I noted that there was much less meandering to the left, right, forwards, and backwards then with the previous model. My first impressions are very favorable. You should know I have not yet set up the heading sensor which allows for “jogging” to the left, right, front, and back. This will truly be icing on the cake.

Back to fishing … with about an hour left before nightfall, I left behind the deep water vertical work, and moved us up into shallower water, hoping to find an onshore migration of white bass pushing shad shoreward and toward the surface as dark approached.

As we arrived at our new area, I noted fish holding consistently along the slope from 20 to 22 feet deep. We tried jigging for these fish to no avail, and then hooked up downriggers to tempt them. This did the trick, allowing us to pull four fish in three passes. Thinking that we may be able to get the same or better results by casting horizontally, I took us both up to the front deck and we began fan casting with blade baits. Long story short, we stuck with the blade baits and consistently put fish in the boat right up until the fish quit at dark.

We ended this trip with 55 fish boated for our efforts, including white bass, hybrid striped bass, largemouth bass, and a freshwater drum.

TALLY = 55 fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:00p

End Time:  7:20p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 81F

Water Surface Temp:  77.1F

Wind Speed & Direction:  SSE8

Sky Conditions: Fair skies with 20% white cloud cover

Water Level: ~0.01 feet high with only evaporative losses

GT = 0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Areas vic 192, 166/1814, 1818, 1819 — all deep vertical jigging for white bass with slabs

**Areas vic 816 and vic 1625 — low light shallow bite on bladebaits

 

 

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

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-LGrD-sm7Bo6tDPIv0z4jg

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/holdingtheline/

This past Tuesday morning, October 25, I fished with longtime Killeen resident, Phil Moore, and his brother-in-law from South Dakota, Garvon Golden.

Garvon Golden with one of just a handful of hybrid we boated on live shad in the final hour of our trip this past Tuesday on Belton.  The white bass were hitting so well it was tough to leave them alone!

Phil Moore with a nice blue cat taken on live shad in 32 feet of water with our baits set up off bottom just a few feet.  Phil and Garvon landed 104 fish in just over 4 hours this morning.

We started up shallow in under 20 feet of water looking for aggressive white bass. We found what we were looking for in 12 to 20 feet of water, with white bass actively feeding from top to bottom. We caught white bass from 0 to 4 years in age both on top water baits when schools briefly broke the surface, and more consistently on slabs work vertically.

After three full hours of nonstop action, our count stood at 77 fish boated. This catch consisted of 100% white bass.

I suggested that we spend our final hour or so targeting fewer, but better quality fish. As the white bass bite was tapering down, we headed out to deeper water, we searched with sonar until I found what I believed were hybrid, we used the Ulterra’s Spot Lock feature to hold us in place, and then got four baited rods down with various sizes of shad ranging from 3 to 5 inches.

The response was nearly instantaneous. From this one area we wound up catching an additional 27 fish in our last hour. This catch consisted of white bass, hybrid striped bass, largemouth bass, blue catfish, and channel catfish. As we approached 11:30, the bite began to soften quickly and, as Phil pulled our 104^th fish aboard (a blue catfish), we decided to call it a good day.

The highlight of this morning’s trip was Garvon’s capture of a new Belton Lake catch-and-release white bass which measured 16.375 inches, eclipsing the previous record by 0.625 inches.  More on the details of this record catch, plus photos, in this coming Sunday’s Killeen Daily Herald fishing column – check out Section C, the sports section.
TALLY = 104 fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:15a

End Time:  11:45a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 64F

Water Surface Temp:  76.4F

Wind Speed & Direction:  SSE8

Sky Conditions: Light fog lifting within the first 60 minutes, with lingering thick grey clouds allowing for low-light conditions through 11am

Water Level: ~0.01 feet high with only evaporative losses

GT = 0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1129/1817/1808 – 100% white bass for 3 solid hours, first on top, then via slabbing

**Area 1805 – live shad for the last hour for a multi-species catch including several 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

YouTube Channel: Bob Maindelle’s Fishing Video/How-to Collection

Pinterest: Bob Maindelle’s Pinterest Boards

This past Monday morning, Oct. 17th, I  fished with Mr. Stephen Miles and his 6-year-old daughter, Kathryn, both of Salado, TX.

Although she certainly liked landing them, Kathryn was not quite so certain about touching them.  Daddy to the rescue!

Steve is a U.S. Army retiree who now makes his living raising longhorn cattle and instructing various forms of martial arts after going “green to gold” and transitioning from an enlisted soldier to a commissioned officer in Army Aviation.

We had great fishing weather today – mild temperatures, wind, and grey cloud cover.  As soon as enough ambient light shone through the grey cloud layer, the fish began to feed and stayed in a feeding mode for nearly two hours in the same area where we’d first encountered them in 20 feet of water.  The fish slowly “slid” downslope to 32 feet of water as the sky brightened slowly.  During this time, we downrigged to catch the shallow fish, and then transitioned to a vertical tactic used while holding directly over the fish with the Spot Lock function on the Ulterra trolling motor.  We managed to catch white bass, largemouth bass, hybrid striped bass, and even a freshwater drum.  By right around 9am the fish slacked off and we left the white bass action behind to pursue sunfish.

Kathryn did a great job at watching her balsawood float as we fished up in under 4 feet of water.  Rarely did I have to tell her to set the hook as I typically do with most kids her age.  Kathryn landed bluegill sunfish, longear sunfish, redear sunfish, and green sunfish during the hour or so we spent up shallow.

By 10:15a, we’d downrigged, vertical jigged, and fished for sunfish.  I asked Kathryn which of these 3 methods she enjoyed most, planning to use that method during our final hour on the water.  She chose downrigging, so, downrigging we went!

I took us out into deeper, 35-40 foot water to pursue white bass this go-round and had to look at two areas before finding what I was after.  The very first set we put down was answered with a “triple”  — one fish on each of the 3 lures on the 3-armed umbrella rig we were using.

As Steve and I kept a close eye on sonar, we watched the fish lose interest with each pass we made until finally, right around 11a, the fish simply failed to show any interest in the downrigger ball and baits passing overhead.

We closed out the trip with 61 fish landed, a very happy young lady, and a TPWD “First Fish Award” hard-earned.  As we walked up to the parking Kathryn told Steve, “Daddy, this was fun.”.

 
TALLY = 61 fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 7:00a

End Time:  11:00a

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 74F

Water Surface Temp:  78.5F

Wind Speed & Direction:  SSE13-14

Sky Conditions: 60% grey clouds on a blue sky

Water Level: ~0.12 feet high with only evaporative losses

GT = 65

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1129/1817/1808 – white bass on downriggers in 20-25′

**Area 1805 – easing for white bass in 30-35′

**Area 971-1609 – downrigging for increasingly disinterested white bass

 

 

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, October 15, I conducted the 18th SKIFF program trip of the 2016 season with 3 young Army anglers aboard.

From left: Analee (10), Alexavier (5), and Mrs. Maria Avalos with a few of the 12-13″ class fish we caught out of large, suspended schools in open water on downriggers soon after launching this afternoon.

5 year old Landon Waldman with one of the white bass he reeled in all by himself.  The three kids also landed a variety of sunfish from still-warm shallow water on this morning’s trip.
Mrs. Maria Avalos brought her oldest two children, Analee (10)  and Alexavier (5). Mrs. Ashley Waldman dropped her five-year-old son, Landon, off with us so she could attend to her younger daughter while Landon enjoyed some time away from the girls in the outdoors. Staff Sergeant Avalos is currently attending an Army school at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. Private First Class (PFC) Waldman has been in the Army for just a year and has been frequently separated from his family during this short period of time.

The wind and cloud cover we enjoyed this morning continued into this afternoon. As we launched, the wind was right at 13 to 14 mph with some mild whitecapping out in open water. We put our first 21 fish in the boat by downrigging in open water with the balls set between 22 and 27 feet, right above where sonar revealed white bass and ample shad showing. During this time, using two armed rigs on each of the two downriggers, we caught more doubles than singles. This is typical when encountering large, suspended school of white bass.

When the novelty of downrigging had worn off, we moved up shallow and targeted sunfish up in cover-filled water allowing each child to catch several sunfish species including bluegill, green sunfish, and long ear sunfish. Right around the time the kids started getting a bit antsy fishing for sunfish, we noticed a stranded boat or out in open water waving to try to get someone’s attention. We approached him, found that his battery selector switch had corroded completely, and offered him a ride back into the dock. The kids were excited that we got to be good Samaritans out on the water.

For our final effort of the evening, we headed into 20 to 25 foot water in an area that had a slow-tapering bottom and which the wind had been blowing onto all day. At around 6 PM, I found abundant, heavily schooled white bass in a feeding posture. I put the boat into a hover using the Ulterr trolling motor, and we proceeded to “wear ‘em out” using a smoking retrieve. Analee fished independently and did very well, I assisted Landon, and Maria assisted Alexavier. With 3 rods going it was just about all I could do to keep Landon fishing and take all of the fish off the hook. We put another 48 fish in the boat in the hour between 6 and 7 PM.

By seven, all the kids had had their fill of the outdoors and it was time to crank up and head to the dock. We ended today’s trip with exactly 90 fish boated.
TALLY = 90 fish, all caught and released

 

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 3:30p

End Time:  7:15p

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 87F

Water Surface Temp:  78.6F

Wind Speed & Direction:  S13-14, tapering slowly to S8

Sky Conditions: 60% white clouds on a blue sky

Water Level: ~0.13 feet high with only evaporative losses

GT = 0

 

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 1223-1079 – open water, suspended white bass on downriggers

**Area 1583 – sunfish

**Area 793-813 – low light white bass via smoking tactic

 

 

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