Word has gotten out that the river run is on… The phone is ringing and the emails are pouring in.

I had my first guided trip on the 2010 river run yesterday. Mike and Gary wanted to target stripers and pike. The conditions were perfect, light rain, no wind and 55 degree water. Gary hooked up on the first drift on a smoke/pearl Houdini. Not a huge fish but we got the skunk out of the boat in a hurry!

We had several fish in the next 45 minutes but none were keepers. As it got lighter and we could see better, we began to see a little surface activity. Mike was throwing a 7″ Revolution Shad and had a couple of big blow ups but none were stuck. On the 4th swipe, he hooked up with a decent fish.

Both Mike and Gary kept picking away at barely legal sized fish for the next couple of hours. The action was great but we were really hoping to see some larger fish…

Around 9, the guys made the call to switch over to pike. As we ran to one of my prime spots, I cut off the light flourocarbon and tied on new 50lb leaders. We stuck with the same lures we had all of our stripers on. Gary had a huge hit on the very first cast but wasn’t ready for it. The fish hit and was swimming right at the boat. He had completely inhaled the Houdin and when Gary set the hook, the fish bit right through the leader… Oh well, at least we know they were there. We fished for the next 45 minutes with nothing so I decided to downsize the Revolution Shads. That was the ticket… In 15 minutes, Mike hooked to real nice pike on a 5″ perch pattern. The first fish put up a hell of a fight, completely clearing the water twice along side the boat. She measured 39″ and had some big shoulders.

The next one was a bit smaller, but just as fiesty. It also hit the 5″ perch pattern. This one measured 36″

Overall, it was a great start to the season. The striper fish will improve over the next few days with more and more big fish showing up… It’s GO TIME!