April 20th fishing report

Written by Mike Peluso

April 22, 2025

Lots of changes keep happening out here on the Missouri River near Bismarck. The biggest has been water temps due to the changes in weather.

Early part of the week things were good with slowly climbing temps. In fact, I kept hearing of even a few walleyes that were spawning already. Later this week however, the temps dropped pretty drastically and has definitely slowed down the spawning process a little. Unfortunately the waters warming and they are back into the spawning mood.

No matter what, these fish don’t all spawn at the same time. We will see 3 different waves of it. It’s crazy, but you can almost set a watch to this no matter what.

The fish (definitely in the southern) stretches of the river have been a lot more consistent. You start to get closer to Bismarck and the water is cooler yet and extremely clear making the bite difficult at times.

We are seeing some of those bigger hens starting to pull up on the shallow sand. When conditions are right, jigs and plastics will shine in this scenario. I am so proud of most folks that are catching those big girls and throwing them back. Hats off!

I think things are really going to heat up here top to bottom these next two weeks. Water is going to continue to rise and the fish will just continue to get more active.

Hard to believe we are already nearing the end of April. My dats really start to blend together. Hence why this report is a day late 

 I literally forgot about it being so busy fishing. Tough problem to have lol

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