MAL Lure | Fishing Report

TURKEY SHOOT!! – 232 FISH @ BELTON

August 10th, 2020August 10th, 2020 by Bob Maindelle

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Monday, August 10th, I fished with Pastor Robert Butts, his 17-year-old son, Jack, and long-time client Marcus Mitchell, all of Georgetown. Robert leads the Union Hall Baptist Church, located in Liberty Hill, TX. Marcus works for a company which produces products to track down “bugs” in complex computer server systems, and Jack is entering his senior year of high school.

PHOTO CAPTION #1: From left: Marcus Mitchell, Robert Butts, and Jack Butts with a sampling of their 232-fish haul from Lake Belton, taken on the new MAL Lures.

PHOTO CAPTION #2: Although I don’t like to target them in the summer due to poor survivability and concerns about delayed mortality, hybrid still show up in the mix with white bass routinely.

WHEN WE FISHED: 10 August, 2020, AM

WHERE WE FISHED: Belton Lake

HOW WE FISHED: I panicked a bit this morning when, at 6:19AM (with a planned trip start time of 6:30AM), Marcus let me know his party would be delayed due to a car fire on U.S. Hwy. 190 which had morning traffic backed up.

As it was, this delay only cost them about 10 minutes, but, when low-light topwater action lasts only for a brief 40-50 minute window, I was concerned that the nice catch and fast action which normally accompany that would be jeopardized this morning. When everyone arrived, they hustled to the boat. I postponed my safety briefing, but not my prayer, and then we took off for the fishing grounds.

Over the next 50 minutes, we enjoyed non-stop catching to the tune of exactly 40 white bass landed, all on my new MAL Lures (found: here). When the sun hit the water, the fish hit the road and shut down in this locale. We went searching for fish away from the crowd and found good results in two distinct locations. My plan was to cover water with the downriggers to find active fish and then fish for them vertically with MAL Lures. However, sonar revealed fish ready to feed before we even got ‘riggers in the water. I Spot-Locked on these fish, initially in 28 feet of water, and we went to work with the MAL Lures simply dropping and reeling them up, expecting strikes as the lures rose off bottom. When the fish slowed a bit, I jogged us 2 or 3 boat lengths deeper to ~32 feet and we kept right on nailing fish. I had Garmin LiveScope playing so the fellows could know when to crank their lures up as fish passed by. As one particularly large, suspended school of fish passed beneath the boat, Marcus exclaimed, “Oh, man, it’s a turkey shoot!”. It was a pretty wild morning.

By the time the fish slacked off in this area, we’d taken exactly 119 more fish for a tally of 159 fish by 9:30AM. A thorough sonar scrub of the area revealed that the fish departed this area very shortly following a wind shift from S to SW.

We moved on to one final location where I’d been finding some fish suspended in over 40 feet of water in the late morning last week. Again, my intent was to downrig to find fish and then work MAL Lures through them to capitalize on what we’d found. As we downrigged, I noted a large shoal of fish off to our left with my side-imaging manually set to 130 feet to the left and right. I set a waypoint on the center of mass of these fish, then used the i-Pilot Link system to send the trolling motor to the waypoint with GPS precision. As the boat moved, we cleared the two white bass which struck the downriggers as we made our way to the fish, stowed the trolling gear, and got ready to work the MAL Lures vertically.

Long story short, in our final 40 minutes on the water Robert, Jack, and Marcus bagged another 73 fish, including 2 hybrid stripers and 71 white bass, to end the 4-hour trip with a take of 232 fish, every last one of which were released.

TALLY: 232 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS: Temperature profile from surface to 60′:

0 feet 84F

5 feet 84.8F

10 feet 85F

15 feet 85F

20 feet 85F

25 feet 84.7F

30 feet 83.7F

35 feet 81.2F

45 feet 76.4F

45 feet 72.1F

50 feet 69.1F

55 feet 67.4F

60 feet 66.6F

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 6:40A

End Time: 10:40A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 77F

Elevation: 1.86′ low, -0.04′ 24-hour change, 51 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp: 82.9F

Wind Speed & Direction: S11 before sunrise, increasing slowly to S13, the shifting and increasing to SW13-14 around 9AM

Moon Phase: Waning gibbous with 61% illumination

GT = 75

Wx SNAPSHOT:

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 813 to B0018G- aggressive low-light topwater action — 40 fish in ~50 minutes

**Area vic 788 – 2 short hops; vertical work with MAL Lures — 119 fish in ~90 minutes **Area vic 1411 – one Spot-Lock; vertical work with MAP Lures — 73 fish in ~40 minutes

Bob Maindelle

Full-time, Professional Fishing Guide and Owner of Holding the Line Guide Service

Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide

254.368.7411 (call or text) Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

Twitter: www.twitter.com/bobmaindelle

#WhiteBassFishing #LakeBelton #StillhouseHollow #BeltonFishingGuide #LakeBeltonFishingGuide

#BeltonLakeFishingGuide #stripers #stripedbassfishing #rockfish #sandbass #freshwaterfishing #fishing

#bass #bassfishing #whitebass #panfish #crappie #fishingonaboat #fishingtackle #fishinglife #fishingsport

#fishingaddict #fishingpicoftheday #fishingtime #fishinggear #fishingday

#Fitec

HIGH COST OF LIVING — 121 FISH @ BELTON

August 3rd, 2020August 4th, 2020 by Bob Maindelle

WHO I FISHED WITH: This morning, Monday, August 3rd, I fished with a crew of four first-time guests. Mr. Bart Dutton coordinated this trip some six weeks ago and brought along his son, Sean Dutton, his stepson, Trevor Holterhaus, and his neighbor, Mike Polcyn. Bart escaped the rules, regulations, taxes, politics and high cost of living near San Diego, CA, and moved his trucking business to Texas. Now, doing the same work he was doing on the West Coast, he’s enable to enjoy the fruits of his labors instead of forking his earnings over to the government just hoping to scrape by. Sean just followed in his father’s footsteps and arrived here last week. Trevor is headed to 8th grade in the Killeen Independent School District, and Mike is an active duty U.S. Army Warrant Officer.

PHOTO CAPTION #1: From left: Mike Polcyn, Sean Dutton, Trevor Holterhaus, and Bart Dutton. This crew of first-timers cashed in on a pre-frontal weather scenario to the tune of 121 fish in 3.5 hours.

WHEN WE FISHED: 03 August, 2020, AM

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

HOW WE FISHED: Today’s real story was the weather. We had a very mild cold front move in today with a barely perceptible wind shift from south, through west, to the northwest. This was like a slower, milder version of the same sort of weather that moved through last Friday. There was a strong topwater feed this morning under low-light conditions, then, after the fish left the surface as the sun’s direct rays shone on it, the fish almost immediately began feeding more sporadically in open water for just seconds at a time. This can be frustrating, as it is rare to sight these fish, then be able to get to them in time to cast, however, seeing multiple schools pop up repeatedly in a defined area reveals their position and makes them vulnerable to downrigging. We took advantage of the aggressive low-light bite, which yielded 79 fish in 65 minutes, most of which came on the MAL Lures in both white and chartreuse, with a few taken on downriggers before the action began, and again after it was tapering off. As this action ended, we moved on to an area where, at any given time, one or two schools of topwater feeding whites could be seen churning the surface in a stretch of about 1/8 of a mile. We took a steady feed of singles, doubles, and a few triples from out of this area with 3-armed umbrella rigs equipped with silver/white #12 Pet Spoons and silver/yellow #13 Pet Spoons. Only one time did we run into a scenario where we could Spot-Lock atop fish and work MAL Lures vertically for them. Under the pre-frontal conditions we were experiencing, I felt we could do better, so, we left fish to find fish which we could fish vertically for. Our tally now stood at 104 fish. In our final 40 minutes on the water (bearing in mind we wrapped up about 30 minutes early when my crew had enough of the Texas heat), we found just what I was hoping to find. As the sonar screen lit up with fish from mid-depth to bottom in about 34 feet of water, both downriggers went off simultaneously. Once we cleared those fish, I went back over that mass of fish, hovered over them with the Ulterra, and we worked MAL Lures through them to put a final 14 fish in the boat before Bart voted we call it a day.

TALLY: 121 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS: We enjoyed yet another pre-frontal scenario, albeit quite mild, complete with a S to W to NW wind shift and solid fishing to match.

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 6:30A

End Time: 10:00A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 72F

Elevation: 1.56′ low, 0.05′ 24-hour change, 51 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp: 84.5F

Wind Speed & Direction: See NOAA graphic; winds followed forecast exactly today.

Moon Phase: Full moon today

GT = 5

Wx SNAPSHOT: Once again, a pre-frontal weather scenario — exciting!!!

AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

**Area 013 to B0180C – low-light topwater action

**Area B0024G thru B0106C – downrigger fish spotted from “popcorn” schooling **Area vic 847/830 – downrigging leading to vertical work with MAL Lures

Bob Maindelle

Full-time, Professional Fishing Guide and Owner of Holding the Line Guide Service

Belton Lake Fishing Guide, Stillhouse Hollow Fishing Guide

254.368.7411 (call or text) Website: www.HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

E-mail: Bob@HoldingTheLineGuideService.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bobmaindelle

Twitter: www.twitter.com/bobmaindelle

#WhiteBassFishing #LakeBelton #StillhouseHollow #BeltonFishingGuide #LakeBeltonFishingGuide

#BeltonLakeFishingGuide #stripers #stripedbassfishing #rockfish #sandbass #freshwaterfishing #fishing

#bass #bassfishing #whitebass #panfish #crappie #fishingonaboat #fishingtackle #fishinglife #fishingsport

#fishingaddict #fishingpicoftheday #fishingtime #fishinggear #fishingday

#Fitec

HE – 1,000 QUESTIONS; SHE – 1,000 FISH; 144 FISH @ BELTON

August 1st, 2020August 1st, 2020 by Bob Maindelle

WHO I FISHED WITH: This past Friday morning, July 31st, I fished with long-time Belton Lake multi-species angler Steve Webb of Harker Heights and his 11-year-old daughter, Bailey (nicknamed Skeeter). Steve books his fishing trips like I book my fishing trips in that he has a purpose in mind and a goal he wants to accomplish by the time his trip with a particular guide is concluded. Today, he came out with me specifically to “pick my brain” about summertime downrigging. He wanted to see how it is done in a real-world scenario, then do it himself so he can enjoy the results when he returns to his own boat and fishes on his own. I encouraged Steve to come with a prepared list of questions, which he did, neatly written down in a rain-proof notebook. Most of the questions I answered on the water, the balance we reserved for the parking lot as the trip concluded. In addition to all of this, Miss Bailey has been tracking the number of fish she’s landed this calendar year. Coming into the morning, her count stood at 988 fish; just a dozen shy of 1,000. A secondary goal of ours was to see her reach her 1,000 fish goal.

PHOTO CAPTION #1: That’s Steve Webb and his daughter, Bailey, with a few of the white bass we took with both downrigging tactics on Pet Spoons and vertical tactics on MAL Lures under pre-frontal conditions. PHOTO CAPTION #2: That’s Bailey’s 1,000th fish of the year, caught sight-casting to schooling white bass under low light conditions using a MAL Lure. WHEN WE FISHED: 31 July, 2020, AM

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

HOW WE FISHED: Given the SSE wind and humid feel to the air, I felt pretty confident that topwater action would emerge under low-light conditions this morning and we were not disappointed. We enjoyed an hour-plus of moderately aggressive topwater action, with Steve and Bailey seated to the left and right of me on my boat’s front casting deck with me in the middle manually running the trolling motor and taking off fish as they landed them on nearly every cast using MAL Lures cast long and worked quickly. As the direct sun hit the surface, the fish quit and we had to move on. We had a short lull in the action as the low-light bite stopped and the open water bite developed, aided by a mid-summer cold-front’s arrival, complete with a wind shift out of the west and accompanying cloud cover. The action built to a crescendo, peaking between 8:30 and 9:30 as the west wind’s velocity peaked during that time and cloud cover built to 100%. During this time we had briefly schooling white bass within 100 yards of us about 50% of the time. Even though these fish did not stay up long, they appeared frequently enough for us to get a bead on where the fish were and where they weren’t. Downrigging put a slow, steady feed of fish in the boat, but, more importantly, allowed me to observe sonar for heavy concentrations of fish worthy of stopping atop of to work vertically for. We did just that on a number of occasions, really racking up the numbers on MAL Lures worked fast and vertical. After reading about the MAL Lures all summer, this was Steve’s first opportunity to see them in action for himself. Long story short, he bought 6 of them on the spot in the parking lot after our trip was concluded!! Read about MAL Lures here: MAL LURES Around 9:30, the white bass were still feeding hard, but, one other thing Steve had requested for this trip was that we leave some time to do some of the shallow water sunfishing with Bailey which the two of them had read of in my reports. We left the white bass biting and headed up shallow to work live bait under light floats for sunfish, landing 31 of them before calling it a day and rolling home just ahead of a line of storms which pushed in from the WNW. A great day of fishing with a great student of fishing and his pretty daughter!!

TALLY: 144 fish caught and released

OBSERVATIONS: Classic pre-frontal conditions and fishing today. Fishing was solid under low light with southerly winds, then under brighter, mid-morning conditions, the westerly wind shift took place and the fishing improved sharply, staying excellent until scaling back a bit as the winds tapered before turning NW with spotty storms spawned along the front all afternoon.

TODAY’S CONDITIONS/NOTES:

Start Time: 6:20A

End Time: 10:45A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 73F

Elevation: 1.42′ low, 0.05′ 24-hour change, 51 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp: 84.5F

Wind Speed & Direction: SSE7 before sunrise, steadily shift through S, to SW, to W during our time on the water. There was a peak wind velocity from 8:30 to 9:30 went the winds went westerly, during which the fish activity also peaked. Sky Condition: 20% cloud cover with white clouds on a clear sky, slowly transitioning to full, bright grey coverage as the winds went westerly

Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous moon w/ 3 days until full moon

GT = 70

Wx SNAPSHOT: Look at that windshift — a fisherman’s dream!!!