We hit the water at 6:00 AM this morning with air temps already creeping into the low 90s and water temps holding steady between 81 and 83 degrees. Sunrise came at 5:50 AM, and we had a light breeze to start—about 6–8 mph—but by the end of the trip the wind had picked up to a steady 15 mph out of the south, with gusts up to 10 mph. We were fishing in about 33 feet of water and were out there until 9:00 AM. This morning I picked up my client Albert and his 10-year-old son bright and early at Rotary Park. We headed straight out to the buoy line and anchored on some numbers that had been producing well last week. I dropped both bow and stern anchors to stay locked in and got the chum working—cut bait and the chum bucket combo. We marked a few fish under the boat and watched them rise in the water column, but they just weren’t feeding. Most of the stripers we saw seemed more interested in chasing shad than taking our offerings. We’d get occasional small pods of bait coming through with a few quick hits, but nothing consistent enough to stick with. At about 7:00 AM, I decided to make a move. The young angler was getting eager to “catch dinner,” so we slid about 125 yards northwest of the first spot and found a large school of striper boiling on bait. We anchored just off the boil, got our scent trail going again, and this time the stripers stacked up under the boat and got active. The bite turned on fast. We caught a few on cut bait, then switched to jigging spoons, which the 10-year-old quickly got the hang of—he was reeling them in nonstop. Fish were flying on deck, smiles were everywhere, and it turned into one of those mornings you just don’t forget. They ended up keeping 18 fish, and I got a text later saying the family was enjoying a good ol’ fish fry that evening. Now, for those of you giving me a hard time about all the dinks lately—you’re going to love this: the biggest fish today weighed a whopping 1.5 pounds! Not much size to brag about, but hey, we’re staying on the fish and keeping the lines tight and the energy high. I don’t have a trip on the books tomorrow morning, so I’m planning a solo scouting mission to try and locate some bigger schools. If you’re waiting to hook into something that pulls back a little harder, now’s a great time to book one of our Flathead Catfish evening charters. With the full moon approaching, we’ve got some prime dates coming up—don’t miss your shot at a true river monster.