His Boys Were Giftin’ Fishin’ – 120 Fish
CLIENTS: This past Friday, December 26, I fished with a crew of three first time guests. Brad Morton‘s sons, Zach and Cameron, treated him to a Christmas fishing trip. There was no way any of us could have known several weeks ago when Zach coordinated for this date that we would be in the midst of an eight day warming trend, which has caused the water temperature to rebound and the fishing to make a nice comeback, as well.
TODAY’S DATE: 26 December 2025 (AM)
NEXT OPEN DATE FOR FISHING: Tuesday, 30 December 2025 (AM or PM)
PHOTO CAPTION: From left: Zach, Brad, and Cameron Morton with hands full of a sampling of the 120 fish they worked up near the end of what will be a 10-day, late December warming trend which has already raised the water temperature from just over 55F to just over 60F.
CAPTION: This nice Lake Belton hybrid striped bass (also known as a “wiper” in other parts of the country) aggressively pursued Zach’s MAL Dense Lure up off the bottom, overtook it, and struck as all of us watched the chase unfold on Garmin LiveScope.
FIND LURES HERE: https://whitebasstools.com/
WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton
SUMMARY OF HOW WE FISHED:
We fished right at four hours this morning and these three fellows picked up exactly 120 fish including one largemouth bass, four hybrid striped bass, and 115 white bass.
Because the water has warmed back up to just above 60°, the white bass are now once again willing to chase farther and faster than they were when the water was just a few degrees cooler. For this reason, starting on Christmas Eve, I changed out my Bladed Hazy Eye Slabs for the MAL Dense lures and that is exactly what 100% of our fish were caught on this morning.
We used the slow-smoking tactic and I emphasized how important it was to get the MAL Lure‘s blade spinning as close to bottom as possible, then to keep the retrieve speed as slow as possible, but without allowing the spinner’s blade to stop spinning.
We were aided by both Garmin LiveScope, which did a great job of showing both fish and lures so that these three fellows could “lead“ the fish and get their lure about 2 feet in front of the fish as the fish were headed toward the lure. We were also aided by the splasher which created commotion and kept a steady feed of fish coming beneath the boat to create a target rich environment. We wrapped up at exactly 11:45 AM after our 120th fish came aboard.
RESULTS: 120 fish, all caught and released
TUTORIAL VIDEO ON HOW “SLOW SMOKE” A BLADED HAZY EYE SLAB VERTICALLY: Click here for tutorial
OBSERVATIONS:
-This was day 8 of a lengthy warming trend which has raised water temperature back up to 60 +/- which has caused fishing to improve.
-No assistance in fish-finding by birds today.
LATEST WATER TEMPERATURE PROFILE:
Taken on Lake Belton around 7:10AM on 25 December 2025…
0 feet 60.6F
5 feet 60.6F
10 feet 60.4F
15 feet 60.3F
20 feet 60.3F
25 feet 60.1F
30 feet 60.0F
35 feet 60.0F
40 feet 59.6F
45 feet 59.4F
50 feet 59.4F
55 feet 59.4F
60 feet 59.2F
65 feet 59.0F
WEATHER DATA:
Start Time: 7:45A
End Time: 11:45A
Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 67F
Elevation: Belton is 0.56′ low with no change in the last 24 hours. USACE is releasing 26 CFS.
Water Surface Temp: 60.8F on the surface.
Wind Speed & Direction: S8 at trip’s start, slowly tapering up to S12
Sky Condition: 100% thick, grey cloud cover preventing “squinting” light from coming through the clouds
Moon Phase: Waning crescent moon at 39% illumination.
GT = 55
Wx SNAPSHOT:
AREAS FISHED WITH MOST SUCCESS:
Area 2334 – 18 fish on slow-smoked MAL Lures
Area 1604/2254 – 17 fish on slow-smoked MAL Lures
Area vic B0202C – 6 fish on slow-smoked MAL Lures
Area vic B0246G – 2 fish on slow-smoked MAL Lures
Area vic B0199C – 1 fish on slow-smoked MAL Lures
Area vic 2335 – 76 fish on slow-smoked 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