WHO I FISHED WITH:

This morning, Tuesday, April 23, I fished with returning guests, Pastor PJ Condit and Pastor Scott Smith.



PJ serves the Community Christian Church in Round Rock, and Scott serves at Crestview Christian Church in Copperas Cove.



This plan came together in under 24 hours’ time as my client originally scheduled for this morning was stuck in Costa Rica and unable to make it in for this trip he had booked more than a year in advance.



Here is how the fishing went…





PHOTO CAPTION: From left, PJ Condit and Scott Smith landed multiple species, including these legal hybrid striped bass, blue cat, drum, and white bass, using live shad on downlines this morning as the south wind returned, bringing increasing warmth and humidity.




PHOTO CAPTION: The full moon shone intensely this morning over the bow as it set in the southwestern sky.

WHERE WE FISHED: Lake Belton

WHEN WE FISHED: Tuesday, 23 April 2024 (AM)

HOW WE FISHED:

I try not to make a habit of having to gather bait just prior to my clients’ arrival. For this reason, I keep a large live bait tank back in my garage and, if anything, just top off prior to my clients’ arrival.



This was not the case this morning , so I wound up throwing the cast net for spawning shad which, around 6:50 AM, began to show up in shallow water to spawn. The plan was to give hybrid striped bass fishing a try, assess where we were after two hours, then decided at that point whether we would press on after hybrid, or swap over to fishing for white bass with artificials.



Things started like gangbusters. Two of our first three fish were legal hybrid, but, we would not see any additional legal hybrid over the remainder of our four hour trip. A lot of white bass are now filtering back into deeper water after doing whatever they did for this year’s spawn given the low water conditions.



So, we often ran into situations where we got baits down and then were instantly inundated with white bass beneath the boat, which then made short work the shad we sent down, regardless of size.



We decided we would keep checking areas and, if any of the first five fish landed were hybrid, we would continue fishing there, otherwise, we would move on until we encountered additional hybrid.



At the two hour mark, PJ and Scott, who have caught hundreds of white bass with me in the past, decided they would like to continue trying for the larger hybrid, so we stuck with fishing with live shad for the remainder of the trip.



By 11:40 AM, Scott and PJ had put together a catch of 75 fish. Those included 2 legal hybrid striper, 1 short hybrid, 2 blue catfish, 6 freshwater drum, and 64 white bass.



After seeing what I observed this morning, I felt any of those locations where the white bass immediately began to form under the boat could have easily produced fish using slabs, as well.



TALLY: 75 fish caught and released



OBSERVATIONS:

Thanks to the return of southerly winds overnight, the threadfin shad spawn continued this morning. Here is the water temperature profile for Lake Belton, measured before sunrise on April 18th …

0 feet 69.8F
5 feet 69.6F
10 feet 69.4F
15 feet 69.1F
20 feet 68.6F
25 feet 68.5F
30 feet 67.8F
35 feet 66.6F
40 feet 65.1F
45 feet 63.9F
50 feet 62.4F
55 feet 61.5F




WEATHER DATA:

Start Time: 7:15A

End Time: 11:40A

Air Temp. @ Trip’s Start: 58F

Elevation: 9.11 feet low, 33 CFS flow

Water Surface Temp: 68.3F on the surface.

Wind Speed & Direction: SE9 before dawn through 8:30, then shifting and increasing to SSW12-14 thereafter.

Sky Condition: Pale blue skies with 40-70% white/grey cloud mix

Moon Phase: Full moon at 100% illumination.

GT = 0



Wx SNAPSHOT:






AREAS FISHED WITH SUCCESS:

Area vic B0089C (15 fish)

Area 836 (7 fish)

Area 1209 (13 fish)

Area B0043G  (9 fish)

Area 1141 (5 fish)

Area 151 (2 fish)

Area 1269 (5 fish)

Area 355 (19 fish)



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

now there are some fishers of men

Now there's two reasons to be blessed w/ a safe and successful trip...

Solid post and fish. Good job as always.