TOPIC:

Planning on an afternoon to dusk trip Friday 9/2/22. Have been watching the Michigan City buoy water temps, and it seems that we have 70+ degrees all the way down to 60 feet the past couple days.
Has anyone been out yesterday / today between 90-120 feet depth that can advise how deep the 50-55 degree water is at?
Going to launch from Portage and head North into Michigan waters. Bringing two youngsters that have never been out, and am getting worried that their first trip may be a boring skunkfest....

Fishing in close for stagging fish. Its been decent. Best shot at some good silver fish. Worse case you get the kids some big drum they'll love it. 

Thanks for the tip! Wouldnt the staging fish retreat from the warm bathwater? Or are they so instinctively driven that they stick around even though it's 72 degrees all the way to the bottom?
will definitely give it a try anyway.

The mc bouy is not always what it is in front of portage, and its starting to get to that point that they don't care. Ill be out front sat a.m. with 2 little guys hoping to get them their first king.

Horny fish don't care about water temp. One of my best fall days ever was in the ship canal in 82 degree water. 
When it's time, the fish will come.  

I’m wondering how they know what the temperature is? How do they find cold water??

As to how it affects the fish, they are definitely less active non warm water but they will run regardless. I’ve been on lower sections of rivers in Alaska that have bumped up into the high 70’s and the fish just go. Those fish in AK had cold water just a couple miles upstream. The fish here don’t know they don’t have the same deal.

Most fish are capable of detecting very small changes in water temperature, and then moving toward whatever their preferred temp is. Called "thermotaxis"

There's always a gradient, essentially, even if it's very very small differences.  Think of it kind of like a ton of different forks in the road, and they are constantly taking the slightly cooler one if they are finding cooler water