Dennis Rhodes with the "over the hill gang"

Cloudy and Cold, Water temperature 55*.
I got out early to catch bait, after a few hours of throwing I still did not have what I wanted so I picked the guys up and topped the tank off. I had concerns before leaving the house this morning not only about bait being tough but with the cold front that we are in and even worse weather moving in tonight fishing may be tough. I set a spread out pulling well over 20 baits at a time covering as much water as I could to put the odds in our favor of catching fish. We worked about 3/4 of a mile before we even got our first hit. I was on the phone with Anthony who was fishing today checking to see if he was doing any better, he at least had a fish in the boat and had a couple more hits when we took our first hit. Brian woke up and wrestled the fish in, I think it may have been his largest fish ever. Now the ice was broken I got serious and put out even more baits. I knew the fish could be tempted to strike and we were going to catch them. My crew was patient with me, I kept telling them if the sun would come out from behind the clouds the fish would eat. This morning was solid clouds and cold but as the day progress we had an occasional break in the clouds, and regardless of where we were we would take hits. At one point I had so many lines out the guys couldn't reel in the fish without getting tangled in other lines, but if that was what it took to get bit so be it. We had a good time today, everyone fished with confidence in me and ended up boating 15 Stripers. A long cold day with a good ending. The guys will have something to talk about on their ride back over the mountain.